i:
i;
II
1
i
! i;
ji
\\\
Jfi||!!l|ll!j:;i,
II I'll!!
ill-:::
THE GIFT OF
MAY TREAT MORRISON
IN MEMORY OF
ALEXANDER F MORRISON
THE
INVASION OF THE CRIMEA
THE
INVASION OF THE CRIMEA
ITS ORIGIN, AND AN ACCOUNT OF ITS PROGRESS
|!(»\V.\ TO TIIK Di:\TH OF LORD RAGLAN
A. W. KINGLAKE
CHEAPER EDITION
VOL. III.
V.'ILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS
EDINBURGH AND LONDON
M C ]\II
All r;hl>'.i remvfi'.
V . 3
C 0 N T E N T S.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAPTER 1.
I.
PAGE
Position on the Alma, 1
IL
Montscliikoff's plan for availing himself of the position, . . 0
His forces, . . . . . . . . . .10
His personal position, . . . . . . . .11
His plan of campaign, . . . . . . . . ]"J
His reliance on the natural strength of the position, . . 12
The means he took for strengthening it, .... 13
Disjiosition of his troops, . . . . . . .14
Forces originally jiosted in the }iart of the position assailed by
the French, 15
Forces originally posted in the part of the jiosition assailed by
the English, .1(5
Formation of the Russian infantry, ... .18
Forces of the Allies, 20
The ta.sks undertaken by the French and the English respec-
tively 21
III.
Conference the night before the battle between St Arnand and
Lord Raglan, 22
432730
VI
CONTENTS.
Chapter I. — coitfiimed.
The French plan,
The part taken l)y Lord Raghm at the conference, .
French plan for the operations of the Enrjiish nriiiy,
St Arnauil's demeanour, ......
Result of the conference,
23
23
25
2G
26
IV.
March of the Allies, .....
Causes delaying the march of tlic English army.
27
28
V.
The last halt of the Allies before the battle,
31
VI.
Meeting between ]\I. St Arnaud and Lord Raglan,
33
VII.
Bos(iuet's advance, .
He divides his force, .......
Disposition of the main body of the French army, .
Of the English army, ......
The leading Divisions of the English army deploy into line.
The Light Division not on its right ground, .
The march continued, .......
35
35
36
36
38
38
40
VIII.
Spectacle presented to tlie llussians by tlic atlvance ot the
Allies, ........•■
Notion whirli tlie Rns.sian soldiers had been taught to entertain
of the English army, .......
Surprise at the sight of the English array.
Fire from the shipping,
Followed by a retrograde movement of Russian troops confront
ing th« French, ........
41
42
42
43
43
CONTENTS.
vu
Chai'Teu I. — continued.
IX.
Half-past one o'clock. C'aiiiiDiiadc directed against the Ei
line, .........
Men of our leading divisions ordered to lie do\vii,
The First Division deployed into line, .
Sir Richard England ordered to sujiport the Guards,
Fire undergone hy our men v.hilst lying down.
,dish,
44
45
45
46
47
X.
Cannonade directed against Lord Kaglan and his staff,
49
XI.
The Allies could now measure their front with that of the
enemy .......... 51
The bearing this admeasurement had \\\nm the French plan, . 52
The ground which each of the leading divisions had to assail, . 52
The village of Bourliouk set on fire by the enemy, ... 54
The effect which this measure liad in cramping the English
line, "... 54
XII.
General Bos(piet, ........
His plan of operations, .......
Advance of Autemarre under Boscjuct in person,
Advance of the detached force under Bouat, .
Further advance of Autemarre's brigade.
Guns brought out again.st him from Ulukul Akles,
Bosq^uet, after a momentary check, estalilishes himself on th
cliff,
Measures taken by Kiriakoff upon observing Bosquet's tuniiii
movement, .........
Horsemen on the cliff, .......
55
56
57
58
58
59
60
60
61
XIII.
The effect of Bosquet's turning movement upon the mind of
Prince Mentschikolf, ........ 61
Vili CONTEXTS.
Chapter I. — continued.
His measures for dealing with it. His flank nianli, . . 63
Mentscliikott' on the cliff, ....... 63
His batteries at length coining u]i, there begins a cannonade
between his .and Bosquet's artillery, ..... 64
Bosquet maintains himself, 65
Mentschikoff counter-marching, .66
Position of Bosquet on the cliff, 66
XIV.
St Arnaud orders the advance of C'anrobert and Prince Na-
poleon, .......... 67
The order into which the Allies now fell, .... 67
Lord Raglan's conception of the part he had to take, . . 67
Artillery contest between the Eussian and the French batteries, 68
Canrobert's advance across the river, 69
His troops arc sheltered from fire by the steepness of the hill-
side, 69
Duty attaching upon the commander of the 1st Frenc h Divi-
sion, .......•••. 71
General Canrobert, . 71
His dilemma, 72
The course he takes, 73
Prince Napoleon's Division, . 73
Fire sustained by the rearward ])ortiona of the French tulumns, 73
Discouragement, ......... 73
St Arnaud pushes forward his reserves, 74
The ill effect of this measure upon the French troops, . . 74
Their complaint that they were being 'massacred,' . . 74
Anxiety on account of Bosquet, 74
State of the battle at this time, 74
XV.
Opportunities oflfercd to Mentschikoff. 76
The battle at this time languished, 77
Causes which had occasioned the failure of the French ojiera-
tions, . . . ■ 79
CONTENTS. ix
Chaptkk I. — continued.
XVI.
A despoiuling account of Bosinict's coiulitioii is Lrouglit to
Lord Raglan, ......... 80
Lord Eaglau resolves to precipitate the advance of the English
army, 81
Grounds tending to cause, or to justify, the resolve, . . 82
Order for the advance of the English infantry, ... 83
XVII.
Evans detaches Adams with two l>attalions, and with the rest
of his Division advances towards the bridge, ... 85
The conflict in which he became engaged, .... 86
XVIIL
Advance of the Light Division, ...... 90
The task it had before it, 90
Means for preparing a well-ordered assault were open to the
assailants, .......... 94
The Division not covered by skirmishers, .... 95
XIX.
The tenor of Sir G. Brown's orders ior the advance, . . 95
The advance through the vineyards, ..... 96
And over the river, ........ 97
Codrington's brigade finds the top of the left bank lined with
Russian skirmishers, ........ 99
Course taken by General Buller, ...... 99
Kature of the duty attaching upon him, . .... 101
XX.
The 19th Regiment, 102
State of the five battalions standing crowded along the left
bank of the river . . . 10-2
Sir George Brown, . . . . . . . .102
General Codrington, .106
X CONTENTS.
Chapter I. — continued.
XXI.
Codringtou resolves to storm llie (Ireat lledoubt, . . . 108
His words to tlie men, ..... ... 108
He gains the top of the haiik, ... ... 108
Lacy Yea and his Fusiliers, .... ... 110
The heaving of the crowd beneath the bank, . . . .111
Effect of the converging tendenr}^ which had governed the
troops, .......... 112
Endeavours of the men to form line on the top of the bank, . 112
The task they had before them, ...... 113
Advance of the Eight-hand Kazan column, .... 114
The column is defeated, and retreats, ..... 115
The Left Kazan column, 115
XXII.
The storming of the Great Kedoubt, 116
No supports yet coming up from the tup of the river's bank, . 127
XXI 11.
The Guards, 128
The Duke of Cambridge, 131
Halt of the 1st Division before entering the vineyards, . . 134
General Airey comes up, 135
His exposition of the order to advance in su[)port, . . . 135
The Division again stopped for a time, ..... 137
Step taken by Evans, 137
The l.st Division resumes its advance, ..... 137
AVant of free communication along a line passing through
enclosures, . ....•••■• 137
Advance of the Guards to the left bank of the liver, . . 138
Advance of the Iligliland lirigade to (lie left liaiik of the river, 139
Time was lapsing, . . . • • • • ■ .140
No support brought by the two l)attalions which remained
under BuUer, 140
Tlie cause of this, 140
CONTENTS.
XI
Chapter I. — continued.
XXIV.
State of tilings ill tlic ivdoiilit, 142
Battery on the higlier slopes of tlie hill brought to hear on (jur
men, 143
Our men lodge themselves outside the parapet, . .144
The forces gathered against them, . . . . . .145
Warlike indignation of the IJussian infantry on the Kourgane
Hill, 145
Movement of the Ouglitz eolunin, 14t>
Advance of the Vladimir column, ...... 147
Confusing rumours amongst our soldiery, . . . .151
Unauthentic orders and signals to the men, .... 151
A bugler sounds the ' retire,' . ...... 154
Double motive for remaining where they were, . . . 154
Conference of officers at the parapet, . . . . .155
Their fate, 155
The ' retire ' again sounded, ....... 155
Our soldiery retreat from the redoubt, 156
Losses of the regiments whieh stormed the work, . . . 157
XXV.
Cause which paralysed the Kussians in the miil.st of their suc-
cess, 159
Apparition of horsemen on a knoll in the midst of the liushian
position, .......... 1()3
The road whieh Lord Kaghin took when he had ordered Ihc
advance of his in fantr}-, . . . . . . .165
Lord Raglan's position on the knuU, ..... 171
His instant apprehension of the ad\aiilage gained, . . . 173
His appeal for a coujile of guns, ...... 174
Progress of the battle then going on under his eyes, . . 175
A French aide-de-camp on the knoll, ..... 176
His mission, . . . . . . . . . .176
Lord Kaglan's way with him, ....... 177
XXVi.
Causes of the depression wliirh had come upon the French, . 178
Operations on the Telegraph Height, 178
Xll CONTENTS.
Chapter I, — continued.
JJaekwanlncss of the 3d Frencli Division, .... 179
Prince Napoleon, ^ 180
The mishaps wliich befell him, . • . . . . ^ 180
The materials from which the hulk of tlie French army is taken, 181
The great difference between their clioice regiments and the
rest of their troops, ........ 182
Each Division, therefore, is furnished witli a Zuuave or other
choice regiment, . . . . . . . . .182
Prince Napoleon is abandoned by his Zouave regiment, . . 183
Also St Aniaud was riding with this Division, and he therefore
was answerable for its place in the field, . . . .184
D'Aurelle's brigade thrusts itself forward in advance of Prince
Napoleon, .......... 184
But in an order which incapacitates it from any immediate
combat, .......... 185
Helplessness of the deep column which was formed by D'Au-
relle's brigade and Prince Napoleon's Division, . . . 186
Condition of Kiriakoff on the Telegraph Height, . . 186
The 'column of the eight battalions,' ..... 187
Kiriakoff is invested with the charge of this column, . . 187
He marches it across the front of D'Aurelle's brigade, . . 188
And then advances upon the right centre of Canrobert's Divi-
sion, ,.......■•
The head of Canrobert's Division falls back, .... 189
State of the battle at this time, 190
XXVII.
The two guns which Lord Raglan had called for are brought to
the top of the knoll, 192
Their fire enfilades the Causeway batteries, and causes the
enemy to withdraw his guns, . . . . . .192
It ploughs througli the enemy's reserves and drives them from
the field, . ' 193
The Ouglitz column was stopped in its advance, . . . 194
So also was the Vladimir, 194
XXVIII.
Progress hitherto made by Evans, 195
Guns heard resounding from the knoll, ..... 196
189
CONTENTS. XI U
Chapter I. — confiinierl.
Their visible effect upon the Causcwiiy batteries, . . .196
Evans advancing, . . . . . . . . .196
Advance of the 47th, 197
Of the 30th, 197
Of the 55th, 197
The enemy does not further resist this advance with liis
infantry, 198
Evans, joined by Sir Richard England in person, now lias with
him thirty guns, 198
Sir Richard England's dispositions for bringing support to
Evans 199
Evans's situation in the mean time, 200
XXIX.
Protracted fight between the Royal Fusiliers and the left Kazan
column 200
The 55th attacking the column in ilank, .... 208
Defeat of the column, 210
It is arranged that the defeated column is to be pressed by the
Grenadier Guards, 212
XXX.
state of the field in this part of the Russian position.
Advance and discomfiture of the Scots Fusilier Guards, .
The Grenadier Guards, .......
Their march up the slope, ......
Codringtou rallying some men of the Light Division,
And proposing to place them in the vacated interval between
two battalions of the Guards, .....
His proposal rejected by the Grenadier Guards,
Continued advance of the Grenadiers, ....
These joined afterwards by other soldiery aligning with tl
on their left, ........
The Coldstr.;am
Temper of English soldiery advancing after a check,
Advance of tlie Highland Brigade
The two battalions remaining with General P)u11it,
Suggestion that the Guards should fall back, .
213
214
220
220
221
221
222
222
223
223
224
225
226
227
xiv CONTENTS.
Chapter I. — continued.
Sir Colin Canii)b(;ll, 228
Campbell's answer to the suirgestion that the Guards should
fall back, . . . r 233
His disposition of the Highland Bri.i^ade, .... '233
The nature of the tight now about to take place on the Kour-
gan&hill, . .' 235
XXXI.
238
Trince Gortschakoff's advance with a colunni of the Vladimir
corps, .......•••
Apparition and voice of ' the mounted officer,' . . . 239
Manceuvre executed by the Grenadier Gnanls, . . . 239
Itsetfect, 240
The Coldstream, 241
Assailed by ordei-s to retire, .241
Its resistance, .......•• 241
The Grenadiers ami the 'Coldstream' engaged with six bat-
talions in column, 242
XXXII.
The stress which a line puts upon the soldiery of a column, , 242
And upon a general who has charge of columns, . . . 243
Impressions wrought upon the mind of Kvetzhiski by tlie Eng-
lish array, 243
The sight of a battalion advancing upon his right front con-
vinces him that he must move, 246
ileantime the colunnis along the redoubt are becoming dis-
tressed by tlie fire of the Guards, 247
Continuance of the fight between the Grenadier Guards and
the left Vladimir column, 249
Defeat of the left Vhulimir column, and of the left Kazan bat-
talions, .....••••• 253
Kvetzinski's obliipie movement of retreat with the right Vla-
dimir column, .....•■•• 254
The Duke of Cambridge is master of the Great Redoubt, . 255
Kvetziuski is wounded and disabled, 255
CONTENTS.
XV
Cjiapti;k l. — continued.
XXX in.
Sir Colin CainpbeH's conception of the ]i:iit \w would take with
liis bri^^Mile, .......
Tlie 42(1 wa.s at liis sidi', . . . . .
Sir Colin Canipbt'll and the Highland Brigade,
Tlu'ir engagement with several Kussian column.'^, .
Defeat of the four Russian column.s,
Stand made by the Ouglitz battalion.s, .
The enemy's neglect of othei- measures for covering the r
Slaughter of the retreating masses by artillery,
Losses sustained by the enemy on the Kourgane Hill,
By the Guards and Highlanders,
treat.
256
256
257
258
269
271
272
273
274
274
XXXIV.
The scarlet arch on the knoll, 276
Eetreat of the last Russian battalions which had hitherto stood
their ground, 278
Final operations of the artillery, ...... 278
Their Icsses, 279
XXXV.
Lord Raglan crossing the Causeway,
Prince Mentschikolf on ground not far oil".
The part he liad been taking in the battle.
His reappearance in the English part of the field, .
His meeting with Gortschakoff, ....
His omission to take measures for covering the retreat.
He is carried along with the retreating masses,
279
279
280
2S2
282
283
284
XXXVL
The array of the I'.nglish army on the ground they had won, . 2?4
Operations of the English cavalry, ...... 285
XXXVI L
Progress of a French artillery-train along the ]>lateau from west
to east, .......... 2SJ
XVI
CONTENTR.
Chapter T. — continved
Officers doscryiiif; the 'column of tlie eight battalions,'
The column torn by artiHcry-ilrc, .
And moved eastward by Kiriakoll',
Its demeanour, .....
Is halted on the rif^dit rear of the Telegraph,
The jiart it had taken in the battle.
288
288
289
289
290
290
XXXVIII.
A flanking fire from the French artillery poured upon the
troops on the Telegrajdi Height, ..... 290
Condition of things in that part of the field, .... 291
The result of what Kiriakoff' had hitherto observed in the Eng-
lish part of the field, 291
His conviction that in that part of the field the Englisli had
won the battle, 292
He conforms to the movement of the troops retreating before
the English, 293
His retreat not molested by French infantry, .... 294
Kiriakoff's artillery, ........ 294
XXXIX.
Great conflux of French troops towards the Telegraph,
Capture of the Telegraph,
Nature of the comljat at the Telegraph, .
Turmoil on the Telegraph Height, .
Marshal St Arnaud, ....
295
295
296
297
299
XL.
Opportunity of cutting off" some of the enemy's retreating
masses, .......... ,300
Vain endeavours of Lord Iiaglan and of Airey to cause the re-
quisite advance of French troops, ..... 300
St Arnaud. Tlie extent to whidi bis mind was brought to bear
on the battle, 301
CONTEXTS.
xvu
Chapter I. — continued.
XLI.
The gvouiul reached by Forey with Louiniers brigade,
Position taken uj) by the rest of the French army, .
301
302
XLIL
The position taken up by Kiriakolf. 302
The effect produced u}ion the Allies by his soldierly attitude, . 303
He moves forward some cavalry, ...... 303
Lord Raglan's ve.\atioiJ, ....--■. 303
XLm.
Question as to the way in which the reti'eat sh'0\ikl be }iressed, 301
Jjord Raj,dan's opinion, ........ 30-i
His plan, 305
It is pro[)Osed to the French, ,.,,... 305
They decline to move, ........ 305
Question whether another uu-tliod with the Frmch niij,'ht have
answered better, , . , . . . . . .306
XI.IV.
The close of the battle,
The cheers that greet Lord Ragkn. ....
His visit to the wounded,
The Allied armies bivouacking on the ground they had won,
Arrival of the troops U4ider Colonel Torreus, .
306
30/
307
308
308
XLY.
Continuation of the Russian retreat.
309
XLVL
Lo.sses of the French,
Of the Engli.sh,
Of the Russians.
The trophici of vi'ctorv wert; scant v,
b
312
312
313
313
XVUl
( mNTKNTS.
ChaI'TKU I. — rotifiiii'i <1.
XLVII.
Qut'stion as to the expediency of attackiiij^ the Russian fo^i-
tinn in front, .........
Tlie plan actually followed by St Arnaud, ....
314
314
XLVllI.
Sumniary of the enemy, .
315
XI. IX.
The meed of glovy fairly earned on the Alma 317
How far the Allies were entitled to take glory to themselves, . 318
Cause tending to impair the efficiency of the French army,
320
LI.
Effect of the battle upon the prospects of the campaign, .
324
CHAPTER II.
The Allied armies after the battle of the Alma,
State of the field after the battle, .
Fate of the wounded Russians,
325
326
329
CHAPTEK III.
Ex])ediency of promptly following up the victory, .
Causes of the ]>rotracted halt on the Alma, . . . .
And of an inchoate intention to abstain from attacking the
North Forts, ....
The Star Fort
Expediency of attacking it,
Perceived by I^ord Itaglan and Sir E'lmuiid Ta
Soundness of their inferences,
The first of the 'lost occasions,'
yons,
337
338
338
347
347
348
348
349
CONTENTS.
XIX
CHAPTER lY.
Advance on the Katclia, .
The village on its banks,
The people of the village.
Lord Kaglan's cavalry already on the Belbee,
Sunday the 24th,
New oKstriiction perceived by the French,
Their request for a little delay,
The advance at length resumed, but without any iixed deter-
mination to attack the ' North Side,' .
Sebastopol in sight, ....
Marshal St Arnaud, . , . ,
His state .
Bend in the direction of the march,
The track of the Russian army,
Q'he proofs of its shattered state not well mastered by tlie
Allies, ......
The invaders descending into the valle)' of the Belbee, .
Keconnaissance by Lord Cardigan, .....
Grave import of a resolve to shun an attack of the ' Xorth Side,'
350
350
350
352
354
354
354
35 r5
356
350'
35tj
35»J
357
3.57
358
358
353
CHAPTER V.
The design of operating against Sebastopol from the north,
The time had now come for a final decision, .
The Severnaya or north side of Sebastopol,
Its value to the Allies, .......
The plateau overhanging the North Side,
The Star Fort,
Endeavours of the Paissians after the ]4th Scjit. to strengthen
the fort and the plateau,
Duns available for the defence, .....
I'art that might have been taken by the fleets in attack on Star
Fort,
Forces available for the defence, .....
The force defending the position on the '24th and ^oth Sept.
Admiral Korniloff, .......
I'olicy of attacking the north fort. .....
In the opinion of Todleben, ......
360
361
3G2
362
363
364
365
3(57
367
363
368
368
369
370
XX CONTENTS.
( 'iiAPTK.R V. — coriUnnod.
Jn that of Lord llaglan and Sir K. Lj-ons, .... ,']70
The objections that were urged against attacking the Xorth
Side, ■ . . ". . . :j7i
Sir Jolin Burgoyne the great opponent, ..... 374
Kecapitulated statement of the French ()l)jection to attack tlu;
' North Side,' 375
lieconnaissance by Sir Ednnmd Lyons, ..... 376
Failure of his endeavour to persuade St Arnaud, . . . 376
Lord Raglan's peculiar aptitude for lessening the evils of a
divided commaiul, ........ 377
Dilemma in which the Allies were placed, .... ."78
The information that had been furnished respecting the land
defences of Sebastopol, ....... 378
By Colonel Mackinto.sli, ....... 379
ByMr Oliphant, 380
Lord Raglan's original iu(din;iti(m, ...... 383
Its revival, 383
Conception of the fiimk march, ...... 3^3
Objections to which the plan was open, ..... 383
The little freedom of choice left to Lord Raglan, , . . 387
Reasons tending to justify the resort to the flank march, . 38S
Light in which Lord Raglan regarded the alternative of the
flank march, ......... 389
Sir John Burgoyne. ........ 390
His opinion, .......... 394
He is requested to ]>ut it in writing, ..... 395
Sir John Burgoyne's Memorandum, ..... 395
l^lan of the flank march propounded to I\rarsluil St Arnaud, . 39tJ
And by him entertained, ....... 397
Lord Raglan's conference with IMarshal St Arnaud on the even-
ing of the 24th, 398
Determination to attempt the tlank march. .... 399
State of Marshal St Arnaud, 400
The decision to which the chiefs cnnie, ..... 400
Probable cau.se of the Marshal's unwillingness to attack the
Star Fort, 400
His bodily state, 401
The avoidance of the Star Fort Wiis the second of the ' lost
'occasions,' ..,.....• 4u3
CONTENTS. XXI
A P P E N D I X.
j^ote 1.— Tlie Strength of the Russian Army engaged on
the Ahna, 405
Note II. — Russian Troops at the Alma, as posted at the
comniencenieut of the Battle, . . . .410
Note III. — Note respecting the Operations of the 7th, the
Royal Fusiliers, . . . . . .411
Xote IV.— Respecting the Statement that Men coming down
from the Redoubt broke through tin; Scots
Fusilier Guards, 417
Note v.— Respecting the Separation of the Vladimir Corps
into two Bodies, . . . . . .410
Note VI.— The Apparition of the ' Unkiunvn Jilounted
' Officer,' 4-2U
Note VII. —Respecting some of the Conditions which may
interfere with the Desire to Fight in Line, . 421
Note VIII. — Ite.specting the abandoned Theory that the Defeat
of the Colunui of the Eight Battalions had
been elfected by Infantry, .... 42"
Note IX. — Note respecting the Truth of the Accounts which
represent that a Great and T'errible Fight took
]ilace near the Telegraiih on the Day of the
Alma, 424
Note X. — Note containing an E.\tr;ict from a Letter ad-
dressed by Colonel Napier, the Historian of
the Peninsular War, to Lord Fitzroy Somerset, 432
Note XI. — Extract from a ]\feniorandum of a Conversation
held with Sir Ednuuul Lyons, which was made
by iMr George Loch, late IM ember for Suther-
landshire, February 10, 1S5C, and approved as
accurate on the same day by Sir Edmund, . 433
Note XII. — Argument for avoiiling the Attack of the Neath
Side, 436
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CIIArTEIl I.
I.
For an army undertaking to withstand tho march chap
of invaders who come along the shore f)-om tlie '
north, the position on the left bank of the Alma f^^Z^
is happily formed by nature, and is capable of
being made strong. The river springs from the
mountain-range in the south-east of the peninsula,
and its tortuous channel, resulting at last in a
westerly course, brings it down to the sea near
the headland called Cape Loukool. In that
region the right or northern bank of the stream
inclines with a very gentle slope to the water's
edge ; but on the south or left bank, the river
presses close against a great range of hills ; and
the rocky acclivities at their base have been so
visibly scarped by the action of the river in its
swollen state, that they almost aflbrd a measure
of the loud, red torrent thrown down in flood-
times from the sides of the Tchatir Dagh. Yet,
VOL. III. A
2 BATTLE OF THE ALM\.
CHAP. SO long as it flows in its summer bed, tlie pure,
, grey sti-e-tm oT t'le Alma, though strong and
rapid oven then, can be crossed in most places
by a full- grown luan wiiliout losing foot. There
are, however, some deeps which would force a
man to swim a few strokes ; and, on the other
hand, the river is passed in several places by
easy and frequented fords. Near the village of
Bourliouk, at the time of the action, there was
a good timber bridge.
Along the course of the stream, on the north or
right bank, there is a broad belt of gardens and
vineyards fenced round by low stone walls, and
reaching down to the water; but on the left or
south side there are few enclosures, for in most
places the rock formation, which marks the left
bank of the river, has its base so close down to
the water's edge as to leave but little soil deep
enough for culture.
The smooth slopes by which the invader from
the north approaches the Alma are contrasted by
the aspect of the country on the opposite bank of
the river ; for there, the field is so broken up into
hills and valleys, — into steep acclivities and nar-
row ravines — into jutting knolls and winding
gullies, — that with the labouring power of a
Eussian army, and the resources of Sebastopol
at his command, a skilled engineer would have
found it hard to exhaust his contrivances for
the defence of a ground having all this strength
of feature.
It is the hi<di land nearest to the shore which
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 3
falls most abiuptly : for when a man turns his CHAP.
back to the sea, and rides np along the river's ' .
bank, the summits of the hills on his right recede
from liim more and more — recede so far that,
although they are higher than the hills near the
shore, they are connected with the banks of the
stream by slopes more gently inclining.
The main features of the ground arc these :
first and nearest to the sea- shore there is what
jnay be called the 'West Cliff — for the ground
there rises to a height of some 350 feet, and not
only presents, looking west, a bluff buttress of
rock to the sea, but on its northern front also
rises up so abruptly that a man going eastward
along the bank of the stream has at first an
almost sheer precipice on his right hand ; and it
is only when he all but reaches the village of
Almatamack that he finds the cliff losing its
steepness. At that point, the ground becomes so
much less precipitous, and is besides so broken,
as to be no longer difiicult of ascent for a man
on foot, nor even impracticable for country
waggons. In rear — Russian rear — of the cliff
there are the villages of Hadji-Boulat, Ulukul
Tiouets, and Ulukul Aides.
Higher up the river, but joined on to the West
Cliff, there is a height, which was crowned at the
time of the war by an unfinished turret intended
for a telegraph. This is the Telegraph Height.
At their top, the West Cliff and the Telegraph
Height form one connected plateau or table-land ;
but the sides of the Telegraph Height have not
r.
4 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, the abrupt cliaracter wliicli marks the West Cliff.
They are steep, but both towards the river and
towards the east tliey are much broken up into
knolls, ridges, hollows, and gullies. At all points
they can be ascended by a man on foot, and at some
l)y waggons. Tliese steep sides of the Telegraph
Height are divided from the river by a low and
almost flat ledge with a varying breadth of from
two to six hundred yards. The ledge was a good
deal wooded at the time of the war, and on some
parts of it there were vineyards or orchards.
To the east of the Telegraph Height the trend-
ing away of the hills leaves a hollow or recess, so
formed and so placed that its surface might be
likened to a huge vine-leaf — a vine-leaf placed on
a gentle incline, witli its lower edge on the river,
its stem at the bridge, and its main fibre following
the course of the great road which bends up over
the hill towards Sebastopol. This opening in tlie
hills is the main Pass ; and through it (as might
be gathered from what has just been said) the
Causeway or great post-road goes up, after cross-
ing the bridge.* At right-angles to the line of
the Pass, and crossing it at a distance of a few
yards from the bridge, there are small natural
mounds or risings of ground, having their tops at
a height of about sixty feet above the level of the
river. These are so ranged as to form, one with
* In speaking of tliis opening as a 'Pass,' 1 have followed
the example of one whom I regard as a great master of the
diction applicable to military suhjects ; but it is not, of course,
meant llmt tliere is anything at all Alpine in the character of
this range of low hills— hills less than 400 feet hi''h.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 6
the other, a low and uneven but almost conlinu- CHAP.
ous embauknieut, running from east to west, and '. —
parallel witli the river. Tiie natural rampart thus
formed controls the entrance to the Pass from the
north ; for it not only overlooks tlie bridge, but
also commands the ground far and wide on both
sides of the river, and on both sides of the great
road. Behind, the ground falls and then rises
again, till it mingles with the slopes and the
many knolls and hillocks which connect it witli
tlie receding flanks of the Telegraph Height on
the one side, and the Kourgane Hill on the other.
Still higher up the river, but receding from it
in a south - easterly direction, the ground rises
gradually to a commanding height, and terminates
in a peak. This hill is the key of the position.*
It is called the Kourgan^ Hill. Around its slopes,
at a distance of about three hundred yards from
the river, the oround so swells out as to form a
strong rib — a rib which bends round the front
* This assertion was denied by a commentator in tlie 'Qunr-
' terly Review,' wlio professed to write witli military knowledge.
It may therefore be well to give here the following extract from
Lord Raglan's j)nblished despatch : ' The high pinnacle and
' ridge before alluded to was the key of the position, and, con-
' seijuentl}-, there the greatest preparations had been made for
'defence.' — Published Desjmtch of the 2Zd Septcmhcr 18.54.
Probably no living man is a better judge of wiuit is the true
' key ' of a position than Sir John Burgoyne. Now, I have be-
fore me a manuscript in his handwriting, which he wrote at
the time, and whilst he was still on the banks of the Alma.
In that paper he says: 'The high pinnacle and ridge on the
' right' [he is speaking of the Russian right, and of the Kourgan^
IHIl] ' was the key of the yoiiiion if attacked in front.' — A'oi« W
4iA Edition.
6 BATTLE OF TIIH ALMA.
C H A 1'. and the flanks of the bastion there built by nature,
' giving a conmiand towards the south-west, the
west, tlie north-west, and tlie north-east. Towards
tlie west, tliis terrace, if so it may be called, is all
but joined to those mounds which we spoke of as
barring the entrance of the Pass, liehind all
these natural ramparts there are hollows and dips
in the ground, which give ample means for con-
cealing and sheltering troops ; but from the jut-
ting rib down to the bank of the river, the slope
is gentle and smooth like the glacis of a fortress.
It was on this Kourgan^ Hill that Prince iMent-
schikoff established h-is headquarters.
Tiie immediate approach to the river from its
right bank is everywhere gentle, but the ground
on its south side is a good deal scarped by the
action of the water; and all along that part of the
river which flows opposite to the Kourgan6 Hill
and the main Pass, the left bank rises almost
vertically from the water's edge to a height of
from eight to fifteen feet.
On the north bank of the river, and at a dis-
tance of about a mile from its mouth, there is the
villaQ,e of Almatamack. On tlie same bank, but
more than a mile and a quarter higher up the
stream, there stood at the time of the war a large
white homestead. Yet a mile higher up the
river on the same bank, and nearly facing the
entrance of the Pass, there stands the large strag-
gling village of Bourliouk. Tlie cottages and farm-
buildings which skirt this village on its eastern
side extend far up the river. From Bourliouk to
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 7
the easternmost part of the position the distance char
is two miles. '___
To ascend the position from the north there are
several frequented ways : —
1. Close to the sea and to the mouth of the
river, there is a singular fissure in the rock through
which there bends a path leading up to tlie top of
the cliff.
2. From the ford at the viHage of Almata-
mack there is a waggon-road which leads up to
the top of the plateau. It was difficult hut
still practicable for artillery,
3. From the white homestead there is a road
which crosses the river and goes up to the plateau ;
but, eitlier owing to the want of a good ford, or
else to the ruggedness of the ascent beyond it,
this road could not be used for artillery. The
want of a road for their guns in this part of
the field was a circumstance which grievously
hampered the advance of the French army.
4. On the western side of the village of Bour-
liouk there is a frequented ford across the river,
and from that spot two waggon-roads, forking off
at no great distance from one another, lead up to
the Telegraph and the villages in its rear. The
westernmost of these roads was found to be prac-
ticable for artillery.
5. Opposite to Bourliouk two almost parallel
waggon-roads lead up from the bank of the river
to the top of the plateau.
6. The Great Causeway, or post-road leading
from Eupatoria, goes through the eastern skirts of
8 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
Bouiiiouk, there crosses the bridge, then enters
tlie Pass, and ascends by a gentle incline towards
the low chain of mounds higher up. After pierc-
ing that natural rampart, it bends into the south-
erly course which leads it to Sebastopol.
7. To the east of the main Pass there were other
roads leading up from tlie banks of the river; but
they need not be specially designated, because,
even where no road existed, the hill-side in this
part of the field was accessible to the march of
artillery.
Except at the "West Cliff, every part of the posi-
tion can be reached by men on foot.
In the rear — Eussian rear — of the hills which
form this position, the ground falls, and it lises
a^aiu at a distance of two miles.
Down to the edge of the vineyards, the whole
of the field on the north or right bank of the river
is ground tempting to cavalry ; and although the
south side of the stream is marked, as we saw, by
stronger features, still the summits of the heights
spread out broad, like English 'Downs.' Except
the sheer sides of the Clilf, and the steeps of
the Telegraph Height, there is little on the
hiffher o-vound to obstruct the manoeuvres of
horsemen.
Eroui the sea -shore to the easternmost spot oc-
ciipied by liussian troops, the distance for a man
going straight was nearly five miles and a half;
but if he were to go all the way on the liussian
bank of the river he would have to pass over more
ground ; for the Alma liere makes a sti'ong bend.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 9
aud leaves open the chord of the arc to invaders chap.
who come from the north.* .
IT.
Against any plan for occupying the whole of
tliis range of hills by the forces of the Czar there
were two cogent reasons: for the summits of the
West Clilf, aud even of part of the Telegraph
Height, were exposed to fire from the ships, and
tlie ground was too wide for the numbers that
could be brought to defend it.
But the whole of the naval and military re- Mentschi-
,,. Ill 1 ^ 1 l^ Uoffs Jil.iii
sources of the Uriinea had been entrusted to the for availing
direction of Prince jMentschikoflf. AVith him it the posiiioa
rested to make head against the invasion ; and
it seems he had been so forcibly struck with the
great apparent steepness of the West Cliff and
the heights connected with it, that he thought
it must be wholly inaccessible to troops. He
conceived, therefore, that he might safely omit
to occup)'' it, and might be content to take up a
comparatively narrow position, beginning on the
eastern slopes of the Kourgane Hill, and termi-
* See the maps at the eud of the volume. I am aware that
in distances, ami in other material points, this description of
the position differs widely from the result of the hasty surveys
wliich were made soon after the battle, by English ollicers.
Tlie French Government plans bear such strong marks of
having been made with great care and labour, that, in geueritl,
1 have ventured to take them fur my guide in preference 'jO
those of my own countrymen.
10 KATTLH OF TlIK ALMA.
CHAP, nutiiig on the west of the Telegraph Height at a
. '. distance ot" two miles from the sea. In tliat
way he thonglit he might elude both of the
o])jections above stated ; for his extreme left
would be comi)aratively distant from the ship-
ping, and the whole ground occupied would be
so far contracted that the troops which he had at
his command might suffice to hold it. Upon tliis
plan he acted. So, although the position of the
Alma, as formed by nature, had an extent of more
than five miles, the troops which stood charged to
hold it had a front of only one league. l*rince
Mentschikoff's resolve was based npon an as-
sumption that the whole of the ground which
he proposed to leave unoccupied was inaccessible
to troops ; but if he had walked his horse into the
waggon-track, which was within half a mile of his
extreme left, he would have found that it led down
to a ford opposite to the village of Almatamack,
and that, although it is true very steep, the road
could still be ascended by artillery. His army
had been on the ground for several days, yet, with
a strange carelessness, he not only omitted to
break up or to guard this road from Almatamack,
but based all his dispositions upon the apparent
belief that the natural strengtli of the ground
secured him against .any hostile approach at-
tempted in that ])art of the lield.
H«8 forces. The forccs brought forward to defend this
position for tlie Czar were IG squadrons of regu-
lar cavalry, besides 11 sotnias of Cossacks, with
44 battalions of infantry supported by 10 bat-
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 11
teries;* and, unless tliere be some grave source chap.
of error in computations long accepted as sound, ^'
these bodies comprised altogether a strength of
39,000 (of whom 3G00 were horsemen), witli as
many as 96 guns.-f-
Prince jNlentschikoff commanded in person His personal
He was a \vayward, presumptuous man, and ^''*' '""'
his bearing towards the generals under his com-
mand wa,s of such a kind that he did not or
could not strengthen himself by the counsels of
men abler than himself. J In times past, he had
been mutilated by a round-shot from a Turkish gun.
He bore hatred against the Ottoman race ; he bore
hatred against their faith. He had opened his mis-
sion at the Porte with insult ; he had closed it with
threats. And now — a sequence rare in the lives
of modern statesmen — he was out on a hill-side,
with horse and foot, having warrant — full warrant
this time — to adduce 'the last reason of kings.'
So far as regards the general scheme of the
* General Todleben puts the number of battalions at 42^
instead of 44 ; but except as regards that small difference
(which I deal with elsewhere) his conclusion as to the number
of squadrons, sotnias, battalions, and guns is exactly the sama
as the one above stated.
+ See No. II. of the Appendix. General Todleben ]iuts the
cavalry at 3C00, in accordance with this statement ; hut, as re-
gards the computation resulting in the sum above stated, lie
differs very widely indeed, and therefore it is that I have re-
sorted to the carefully qualified, and even conditional, language
above appearing. The subject will be found fully treated in
No. I. of the Appendix.
J I infer this from tlie fact that, the day before the action,
General Kiriakoff, an officer of high reputation, was attempting
indirect methods of calling Prince Mentschikoff''s attention to
the defectiveness of liis arrangements. — Kiriukqff'a Stutanent.
12 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, campaign, liis conception, it seems, was this: ho
' would sufler the Allies to land without raolesta-
l^in.^It.?,."^ ^'5 on, because he desired that the defeat which
lie was preparing for them should bo, not a mere
repulse, but a crushing and signal disaster. He
would nut attack them on their line of march,
because he liked better to husband his strength
f(H' the great position on the Alma. It seemed to
him that there he could hold his ground against
the invaders for three weeks ; and his imagina-
tion was that, baffled for many days by the
strength of his position, drawing their supplies
from the ships with pain and uncertainty, and
encumbered more and more every day with
wounded men, the Allies would fall into evil
days. In tlie mean time, the troops long since de-
spatched from Bessarabia would begin to reach
him by way of Perekop and Simphcropol ; and
thus reinforced, he would in due season take the
offensive, inflicting upon the Western Powers a
chastisement commensurate with their rashness.
His reliance Priucc Mcutschikoff Tcstcd this structure of
on the
uaturai hopc UDon tlic assumptiou that he could hold the
Btreugth of ^ ^ ^
the position, position ou the Alma for at the least many days
together, and against repeated assaults. Yet he
took little pains to prepare the ground for a great
defence.* On tlie jutting rib which goes round
tlie front of the Kourgan^ Hill, at a distance of
* I say tins in tlie teeth of the English desjiatclies, and, I
fear, of nuiny written and oral statements from oflScers ; but 1
am sure that every engineer who saw the ground will support
my assertion.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 13
about 300 yards from the river, he threw up a chap.
breastwork — a -vvorlc of a very slight kind, pre- '
senting no physical obstacle to the advance of ^et(J^^fo^
troops, but sufficiently extended to be capable of cnin'lfii."
receiving the twelve heavy guns witli which he
armed it.* This work, on the day of the battle,
was called by our people the 'Great Redoubt.' f
Trince Mentschikoff was delighted with it. ' Is
' not this a grand thing ? ' said ho to General
Kiriakoff the day before the action; 'see, it will
' do mischief both ways.' And he then pointed
out how, whilst the face of the redoubt com-
manded the smooth slope beneath it, the guns at
the shoulder of the work would throw their fire
across the great road on either side of the bridge.
* In speaking of this field-work, one of tlie Reviewers ex-
pressed a belief 'that its armament consisted of six or eight, not
guns of 'position, but field-gnns and liowitzers.' As to the
number of the guns, I rely upon Prince GortscliakofT iiimself,
as well as upon General de Todleben, p. 173. And in proof
tiiat they were ' guns of position ' I say tliat the two of them
which were captured by our army are now at Woolwiuli, and
liave been duly measured. The report from Woolwich snys : —
'The calibres of the guns taken at tlie Alma were as follow : — •
Bnuss shot-gun, . . 4.82 inches.
,, howitzer, . . 6.12 ,,
t The work was formed by cutting a shallow trcncli and
throwing up the earth in front of it. In calling this and the
other entrenchment ' redoubts,' I follow tlie language very gen-
erally used by our officers on the day of the battle ; but they
were open towards the rear, and therefore, of course, the use of
the term in its special sense would be inaccurate. The word,
however (like some others, as, e.g., the word 'ship'), has a gen-
eral, as well as a special, meaning, and, accordingly, St Arnaud,
in his official despatch, calls these works 'rcdoutes.' Sir Colin
Campbell, in his despatch, also calls tiie greater of tlie two
works a * redoubt.'
14 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. On the same hill, hut higher up and more to
. ! his right, the Prince threw up another slight
breastwork, which he armed with a battery of
field-guns. Tiiis was the Lesser Redoubt.
The vineyards at some points were marked and
cleared so as to give full effect to the action of the
artillery ; but except the two redoubts, no fiehl-
works were constructed by the Eussian Generah
Wilful and confident, he was content to rest
mainly upon the natural strength of the ground,
the valour of his troops, and the faith that he had
in his own prowess as a commander. lie even
omitted, as we have seen, to break np or to guard
the waggon-road which led np from Almatamack
to the left of his position. The Prince did not
attempt to occupy the West Cliff; but some
days before the action, a battalion * supported
by half a battery had been placed overlooking
the sea in the village of Ulukul Akles, in ordei-,
as was said, to ' catch marauders,' or to prevent
a descent from the sea in the rear of the Piussian
army ; and the detachment remained in that
part of the field until the time when the battle
began.
Disi.osi- On the IcdLre M'hich divided the river from the
tlOlinfluS '^
troois. steep broken side of the Telegraph Height Prince
Mentschikoff placed four Militia -|- battalions, and
* The Ko. 2 battalion of Minsk.
+ I adopt tliis inaccurate term as the hest T can find to de-
scribe these scnii-regular troops, becanse to call them, as the
Russians do, 'reserve battalions,' would tend to confuse, by
suirr^estiuf^ the iclea of 'reserves' in the ordinary sense. I
thought at one time I might liave called them ' depot battal-
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 15
Buppovted them by three battalions of rcguhir chap.
infantry,* placed only a liundred and fifty yards .
in their rear, and by a fourth battalion f drawn
up in a neighbouring ravine.:[; Further still in
rear, he held in hand, as a reserve for his left
wing, the four battalions of the ' JNIoscow ' corps
which had joined him that niorning.§ At the
commencement of the action, these thirteen bat-
talions, with one or two companies of the 6lli
Ilifles, and a ten-gun battery of artillery,!! were Fr.irrs
the only forces occupying the part of the position posted in
then about to be assailed by the French. They the position
, assaileil by
formed the left wing of the Paissian army, and tLeFreuch:
were commanded by General Kiriakoff.
In this western part of the position the ground
at the time of the battle had not been strength-
ened by field-works.
In the main Pass, facing the bridge, and des-
tined to confront the 2d Division of the English
army, Prince Mentschikoff placed four battalions
of light infantry ,11 with also some portion of the
' ions,' but upon the wliole it seemed to me that the toiTA
'militia' would be less likely to convey a wrong notion than
the term 'dep6t.* They are troops regarded as very inferior in
quality to troops of the line. The four battalions which 1 call
' militia' wore the 'reserve' battalions of the 13th Division. —
A n itchkoff, Chodaslcwkz.
* Nos. 2, 3, and 4 of the Taroutine corps. — Ilnd.
+ The No. 1 battalion of the same corps. — Ibid.
+ Chodasiewicz.
§ The battalions of the Moscow corps. — Anitclikoff^Clmdasiewicz.
II Viz., the No. 4 battery of the 17th brigade of artillery.
—Todlcbcn, p. 177.
H The foui 1 iittalions of the Borodino corps. — Anitchkofl,
Chodasiavlc:, I'odkhcn,
16 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
cu A r. Gth lUflcs ; * and some of these troops had orders
• to advance and skirmish in the vineyards. Near
Tdg^naiiy ^^^^ bridge, and with materials in readiness for
{i?ep'irt"of destroying it, there was posted a battalion of sap-
assai'iedV.y" P^s and mlners. f Astride the gi-eat road, and
the English, disposed along the chain of hillocks which runs
across tlie Pass looking down on the bridge, there
were planted the sixteen pieces of field-artillery
which are here termed 'the Causeway batteries,' J
whilst eight other guns placed furtlier eastward
connected the defences here ranged with those of
the Kourgane Hill. § The force in this part of
the field formed the centre of the Uussian line of
battle, and was practically under the orders of
Prince Gortschakolf, || who also, however, com-
manded the whole of the enemy's right wing.
The right wing of the Russian army was the
force destined to confront, first our Light Division,
and then the Guards and the Highlanders. It
was posted on the slopes of the Kourgane Hill.
Here was the Great Eedoubt, armed with its
* Anilchkoff, Cliodasiewlcz, Todlrbcn.
+ Anitclikoff .speaks of tliis body as a whole battalion, but
Grncral de Todleben calls it only a half battalion.
X Prince GoitschakofT says that the Causeway j,Tins were
eighteen in number.
§ The 2i giins above mentioned were furnished by the two
12-gun Light batteries, Nos. 1 and 2 of the ICth Artillery
brigade. — Anitclikoff, Chodadcwicz, 'fudlchcn.
II The Borodino corps formed part of General KiriakofTs
command ; but the nature of the ground and the course which
the action took prevented him from having it in his actual con-
trol ; and Gortschakoffwas the General to whom the corps had
to look for guidance.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 17
twelve heavy j^uiis;* and Prince Meutscliikoff cilAP
was so unsparing of efforts to defend this part of '
the ground, that he gathered, on the slopes of
the hill, a force of no less than sixteen battalions
of regular infantry ,-|- besides the two battalions
of sailors, I and in addition to the twelve guns
last mentioned, four batteries of field -artillery.§
The right of the forces on the Kourgane Hill
rested on a slope to the east of the Lesser Ee-
doubt, II whilst their left touched those other de-
fences wh.ich barred, as we saw, the great road.
Twelve of the battalions of regular infantiy were
posted on the flanks of the Great Redoubt ; whilst
the other four battalions, drawn up in one massive
column, were held as a reserve for the right wing
on the higher slope of the hiil. One of the field-
* No. 1 12-gun battery of position, IGtli Artillery Brigade. —
Todleben.
+ The four battalions of the Kaxan, or Prince Jlichael's
corps, the four battalions of the Vladimir corps, the four bat-
talions of the Sousdal corps, and the four battalions of the
Uglitz corps. — Anitchhoff, C'hodasiewicz, Todlehen.
J Chodasiewicz. AnitehkofT calls this force a half battalion
only; and Todleben speaks of it as one battalion; but C'ho-
dasiewicz saw the two battalions in march with their four guns,
and I accept his statement, for he was an admirably accurate
observer. Before the action began these seamen were thrown
forward as skirniishers, and endeavoured to operate in the vine-
yards which belt the right bank of the river, but were after-
wards withdrawn to the Kourgane Hill.
§ Two of the 14th Artillery Brigade, and two of the Don
Cossack Batteries. The five batteries altogetlier numbered 44
guns. — Todleben.
II From the Lesser Kedoubt there were only fired five guns
at tlie time when the Highlanders advanced ; but it is believed
thit tlie three additional guns requisite to complete the battery
were in the work at the beginning of the action.
VOI^ in. B
18
BATTLE OF TIIH ALMA.
CHAP.
I.
Formation
ortlje
Kussian
Infantry.
Latteries armed the Lesser Iiedoubt, another was
on tlie higli gronnd commanding and supporting
the Great Hedoubt, and two were hekl in reserve.*
Though subordinated to Prince Gortscliakoff,
General Kvetzinski was in immediate command
of the troops in this part of the field.
As regards the formation of the Russian infan-
try in this and other parts of tlie fiekl, it may be
said, speaking generally, that those battalions
which operated in the immediate rear of the
skirmishers were broken up into columns of com-
l-)anies, whilst tlie battalions supporting them stood
massed in columns of attack.
On his extreme right, and posted at intervals
along a curve drawn from his right front to his
centre rear, Prince JMentschikoff placed his six-
teen squadrons of regular cavalry and his eleven
sotnias of Cossacks, making up altogether a force
of 3600 horsemen.
Thus, then, it was to bar the Pass and the great
road, to defend the Kourgan^ Hill and to cover
his right flank, that the Russian General gathered
his main strength ; and this was the part of the
field destined to be assailed by our troops. That
portion, of the Russian force which directly con-
* Although I necessarily gather the minibers and ilcscrip-
tions of tliese forces from Kussian authorities, I draw nuR-h of
my knowledge of the way in which they were disposed from
the observation of ourofHcers ; and it should he observed that the
above description, so far as concerns the cavalry, applies rather
to the state of the field at the time when the battle was going
on, than to the disi)Ositions which Prince Mcntschikofl" may
have made in the earlier part of the day.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 19
fronted the English army, consisted of twenty- chap,
seven squadrons or sotnias of horse, with twenty-
three battalions of infantry, besides the before-
mentioned part of the 6th Fiiflcs, and was sup-
ported by sixty -eight guns.*
But besides this force, Prince Mentschikolf, at
the commencement of the action, had posted
across the great road leading down to the bridge
a force of seven battalions of infantry,-]- with two
batteries J of artillery. These troops he called
his ' Great JJeserve ; ' and they were, in fact, his
last. § Yet he held them so closely in rear of the
battalions facing the bridge, that they might be
regarded as forces actually operating in support.
Plainly this disposition of his troops was governed
by a keen anxiety to defend the great road and
the Kourgane Hill — for it was so ordered that, to
sustain the struggle there, it would cost him but
a few moments to bring his last reserves into
action ; and, in truth, he committed himself so
• TodkUn, p. 178. Viz. :—
Causeway batteries, . , . 16
Adjoining batteiy, ... 8
Kourgau^ do., ... 44
68
t The four battalions of the Volhynia corps, and three bat-
talions, Nos. 1, 3, 4, of the Minsk cor\)5.—Aniichl:off, Cliod-
asiewicz, Todlehe.n.
J No. 5 light battery of the 17th brigade of Artillery, and
the No. 12 troop of Horse- Artillery. — Todleben, p. 173.
§ The sixteen squadrons of regular cavalry were also con-
sidered as a part of this ' Great Reserve ; ' but, as we liave seen,
tlipy did not remain posted on the same ground as the infantry
reserve.
I.
20 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, deeply to this, liis favourite part of tlie battle-
• field, that, when he afterwards endeavoured to
shift a portion of the Great Reserves towards his
left, he was unable to make their strength tell.
Forces of Tlie forces with which the Allied commanders
prepared to assail tliis position M-ere thus com-
posed : There were some 30,000 French infantry
and artillerymen,* with sixty - eight guns ; and,
added to this force, under the command of the
INIarshal St Arnaud, was the division of 7000
Turkish infantry.-}- With Lord Eaglan, and
present under arms, there was a force of fully
1000 cavalry, 25,000 :|: infantry and artillerymen,
and sixty pieces of field-artillery. § In all, the
Allied armies advancing upon the Alma com-
prised near 63,000 men and 128 guns.
St Arnaud, with his 37,000 infantry and artil-
lerymen and sixty - eight guns, and effectually
supported by the fire of nine war-steamers, || was
destined to confront at the commencement of the
* 'Precis Ilistorique,' pp. 101, 102, which gives 30,204 as
the total, but that is a computation of the force embarked ; and,
since cholera was prevailing, the deductions from strength be-
tween the 7th and the 20th of the month must have brought
the numbers below 30,000.
+ Ibid.
t Or, speaking more closely, 24,400. The 'morning state'
which I have before me is of the 18th September, and it gives
as present under arms (without including the cavalry, of which
there was no ' state ') a total of 26,004 officers and men, and, de-
ducting the 1600 men detached under Colonel Torrens, there
remained 24,404 infantry and artillerymen.
§ The official 'state' prepared for Lord Eaglan gives two
troops of horse-artillery, and only seven batteries, but it omits
the liattery attaclied to the 4th Division.
U Official despatch of Admiral Hauielin.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 21
action much less than ono-tliird part of the PiUS- chap.
sian force ;* whilst much more than the other ,
two-thirds of it was left to the care of the Eng-
lish. St Arnaud, with his Frenchmen alone, was
to his then confronting adversaries in a proportion
not very far differing from that of three to one ;
and tlie 7000 Turks that he also commanded in-
creased yet further his great numerical preponder-
ance, whilst, moreover, of guns he had sixty-eight
to ten. Lord Raglan, on the other hand, was upon
the whole fairly matched by his appointed antagon-
ists in numbers of men and guns ; f but the dis-
tinguishing characteristic of the task that awaited
him was this : — he had to attack troops entrenched,
and entrenched too upon very strong ground.
The heights about to be invaded by the French The tasks
presented grave physical obstacles to their ad- by tiie
vance, but the greater part of them were unde- theEngUsh
fended by troops, and had nowhere been strength-
ened by field-works. The ground attacked by the
English did not oppose great physical obstacles
to the advance of the assailants, but it had been
entrenched, and, besides, was so formed by nature
as to give great destructive power, and, by con-
sequence, great strength, to an enemy defending
it with the resources of modern warfare.]: The
* Tlie iiroportion clianp;ed afterwards, as will be liy-and-by
.shown.
t In the Ap]tendL\; No. II., the proportions are shown with
more particularity ; and the two la.st footnotes annexed to the
Table there given show the changes that those proportions
underwent in the course of tlie action.
+ In these days, mere inert physical obstacles are commonly
22
BATTLE OF THE AUIA.
CHAP.
I.
French were covered and su])ported on their right
by tlie sea and the ships ; on their left, by the
Enghsh army. The English were covered on
their right by the French, but they marched with
their left flank quite bare. The French advanced
upon heights well surveyed from the sea. Ex-
cept in an imperfect way from maps, the English
knew nothing of the ground before them. No
deserters, no spies had come in.
Conference
the ni^'ht
before the
battle be-
tween St
Arnaud
and Lord
Raglan.
Ill,
Late in the evening of the 19th, Marshal St
Arnaud, attended by Colonel Trochu, rode up
to the little post-house on the Bulganak in which
Lord Raglan had established his quarters. He
came to concert a plan of attack for the following
day.
From on board their ships the French had long
been busily engaged in surveying the enemy's posi-
tion, and by this time they had gathered a good
deal of knowledge of that part of the ground which
lies near the sea-shore. They had ascertained,
or found means of inferring, that the stream was
fordable at its mouth, and they moreover assured
themselves that, at the time of their last observa-
tions, the West Cliff was not occupied in strength
by the enemy. Upon these important discoveries
overcome or eluded ; and the security of tlie defender depends
not in general upon those geogi-aphical features which would
make access difficult for travellers, but rather upon such a con-
formation of ground as will give him the means of doing harm
to his assailants.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 23
Marshal St Arnaud based his ydan of attack. He chap.
proposed that the war-steamers, closiug in as nearly '
as was practicable, should move parallel with the ^lau.^"'"''"'*
land-forces, and a little in advance ; that, under
cover of their fire, a portion of the French force
should advance along the shore and seize the "West
Cliff; and that this movement should be followed
up by a resolute, vigorous, and unremitting attack
upon the enemy's left flank and left front.* !M.
St Arnaud was at this time free from pain ; and,
knowing that now, at last, he had an enemy in his
front, and that a great conflict was near at hand,
he seemed to be fired with a more than healthy
energy. Sometimes in English, sometimes in the
rapid words of liis own tongue, and always with
vehement gesture, he laboured to show how sure
it was that the attack from his right centre would
be fierce, unrelentinf]^, decisive. Lord Eaglau, The part
, ' . . , ' takeu br-
east in another mould, sat quiet, with governed LordHag-
' i- > o Ian at the
features, restraining — or only, perhaps, postpon- coufereLca.
ing — his smiles, listening graciously, assenting, or
not dissenting, putting forward no plan of his
own, and, in short, eluding discussion. This
method, perhaps, w^as instinctive with him ; but,
in his intercourse with the French, he followed it
deliberately and upon system. He never forgot
tliat to keep good our relations with the French
was his great duty ; and, studying how best to
* The plan was like that of the j^reat Freileiick at LciUhcn,
but with the difrerence that the force advancing to turn the
enemy's left was to be covered and supported by fire from tha
shipping.
24 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, avert the danger of misuuderstaiulings, he had
. L_ already made it his maxim tliat there was hardly
any danger so great as the danger of controversy.
AVhether in any even small degree the English
General had been brought to share the opinion
entertained of j\T. St Arnaud in the French capi-
tal and in the French army, the world will never
know. Of a certainty, Lord Eaglan dealt as
though he held it to be a clear gain to be able to
avoid entrusting the Marshal with a Icnowledj^e
of what our army wo\dd be likely to undertake ;
but my belief is that this, his seemingly guarded
method, was not so much based upon anything
v/liich may have come to his ears from Paris or
from the French camp, but rather upon his desire
to ward off controversy, and upon his true native
English dislike of all premature planning. He
was so sure of his troops, and so conscious of his
own power to act swiftly when the occasion might
come, that, although he was now within half a
march of the enemy's assembled forces, he did
not at all long to ruflle his mind with projects —
with projects for the attack of a position not
hitherto reconnoitred.
M. St Arnaud's plan of turning the enemy's
left was to be executed by the French army, with
the aid of the shipping ; and the part which the
English land-forces should take in the action was
a matter distinct. But for this, also, the French
commander and his military counsellors had care-
fully taken thought.
To illustrate the operations which he proposed,
BATTLE OF THE Al.MA. 25
^I. St Arnaiul produced a rough map, — a map cHAP.
slightly and rapidly drawn, yet traced with that '
spirit and significance which are characteristic of ^,7^,';^ •''''"
French military sketches. In this sketch Bos- Z^^;;"
quet's Division and the Turkish troops were """^■
represented as effecting the turning movement
on the enemy's left; and the 1st and 3d French
Divisions were shown to be so deployed, and so
placed, that, in the order of attack assigued to
them by the sketch, they would confront almost
the whole face of the enemy's position, leaving
only one or two battalions to be dealt with in
front by the English troops.* So, to find some
occupation for the English, the sketch represent-
ed our army as filing away obliquely, in order
to turn the enemy's right flank. Of course this
plan rested entirely upon tlie assumption that
tlie enemy's front would be fully occupied (as
represented in the sketch) by the French attack.
Lord Eaglan's experience or instinct told him
that no such plan as this could go for much until
the assailing forces should come to measure their
line with that of the enemy. So, without either
combating or accepting the suggestion addressed
to him, he simply assured the ^Marshal that he
might rely upon the vigorous co-operation of the
•See the fac-simile of this plan, taken fioni the 'Pieces
' OSicielles,' published by the French Government. — £nd of
Note to \st Edition.
My justification for saying (in the corner of the plan) that it
was 'untntbj stated to have been accepted by Lord Raglan,'
will be found in succeeding pages, and in particular at pp. 259,
276, 277.— Note to ith Edition.
26 r.ATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. Britisli army. The French plan seems to have
. made little impression on Lord Eaglan's mind.
lie foresaw, perhaps, that the ingenuity of the
evening would be brought to notliingness l)y the
teachings of the morrow.
stAnmiKVs Whilst the French Marshal -was striving, in
deiueaiiour. , . i • ^ ,• ^
ins vehement way, to convey an idea ot tlie
vigour with which he would conduct the attack,
his appointed adviser, Colonel Trocliu, whose
mission it was to moderate the fire of his chief,
thought it right to interpose with a question of
a practical kind — a question as to the time and
place for relieving the French soldiers of their
packs. Instantly, if so one may speak, St Arnaud
reared, for Trochu had touched him with the curb,
and in the presence, too, of Lord Eaglan. He
angrily suppressed the question of the packs as
one of mere detail. Yet, on the afternoon of the
morrow, that question of the packs was destined
to recur, and to govern the movements of the
whole French army.
Before the jNIarshal and Lord Raglan parted, it
was agreed that Bosquet with his Division should
advance at five o'clock in the morning, and that,
two hours later, the rest of the Allied forces should
begin their march upon the enemy's position.
Result of This determination as to the time for marcliing
eiice. was almost the only fruit which St Arnaud drew
from the interview He had thought to engage
his colleague in the plan contrived for the guid-
ance of the English at the French headquarters ;
but when he came to be in the presence of the
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 27
English General, ho unconsciously yiekled, as chap.
other men commonly did, to the spell of his ,
personal ascendancy ; and although he showed
the sketch, and may have uttered, perhaps, a
few hurried words to explain its meaning, he did
not effectually bring himself to proffer advice to
Lord Piaglan. Either lie altogether omitted the
intended counsel, or else he so slurred it over as
not to win for it any grave notice from even the
most careful of listeners.
When the conference ended, Lord Eaglan came
out with his guests to the door of the hut. M.
St Arnaud mounted his horse, and was elate ; hut
he was elate, not with the knowledge of having
achieved a purpose, but rather, it would seem,
from the sense of that singular comfort which
anxious men always derived from the mere power
of Lord Eaglan's presence. Perhaps, when the
Marshal reached his quarters, he began to see
that, after all, there was a gulf between him and
the English General, and that, notwithstanding
his energy and boldness, he had been unaccount-
ably hindered from passing it.
IV.
It had been determined that the troops should March of
the Alliefi
cet under arms without bugle or drum.
Silently, therefore, on the morning of the 20th
of September 1854, the men of the Allied armies
rose from their bivouac, and made ready for the
march which was to bring them into the presence
28 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP of the enemy. It was so early as lialf-past five
• that Bosquet, with the 2d French Division and
the Turkish battalions, began his march along
the coast; and at seven o'clock the main body of
the French army was under arms and ready to
march. But the position taken up by the Eng-
lish for the defence of the Allied armies on the
Bulganak had imposed upon Lord Raglan the
necessity of showing a fi'ont towards the east ; and
for the Divisions so employed a long and toilsome
evolution was needed in order to bring them into
Cst'MCi de- the general order of march.* At that time too,
march of'* there was a broad interval between our extreme
army"^"'' right and Prince Napoleon's Division. Moreover,
the line of the coast which the armies were to
follow trended away towards the south-west,
forming an obtuse angle with the course of the
stream (the Bulganak) on which the Allies had
bivouacked ; and in the movement requisite for
adjusting the front of the Allied forces to the
direction of the shore, the English, marching
upon the exterior arc, had to undergo more
labour than those who moved near the pivot on
which the variation of front was effected. "f"
This was not all. The baggage-train accom-
* Those divisions had been posted nearly at right angles to
the front line, and the segment in which the troops would have
to wheel in order to get into the line of march would be nearly
90 degrees.
t Several military reports and documents explain this, but
the plan prepared by the French Government shows with ad-
mirable clearness the nature of the evolution which the English
army had to perform. See the plan, No. 4, ' Invasion of the
' Crimea,' vol. ii. of Cabinet fldition.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 29
panying our forces, tliougli small in comparison chap.
with the encumbrances usually attending an army "
in the field, was large as compared with that of
the French ; and Loi'd Kaglan (whose favourite
anxiety was concerning his reserve ammunition)
refused to allow the convoy to be stripped of pro-
tection. The oblique movement of the troops to-
wards their right was tending to leave the convoy
uncovered ; and in order that it should be again
enfolded, as in the previous day's order of march,
it was necessary to move it far towards our right.
Lord liaglan insisted that this should be done ;
so on the morning of the long-expected battle, and
with the enemy in front, St Arnaud and the whole
French army, and the English army too, chafed
bitterly at the delay they liad to endure whilst
strings of bullock-carts were slowly dragged west-
ward into the true line of march. Besides, the
enemy's cavalry gave the English no leave to
examine the ground towards which they were
marching ; and whilst the Ei'ench, being next to
the sea, could make straight for the cliff already
reconnoitred from the ships, the English army
advanced without knowledge of that part of the
position which it was to confront, and was twice
compelled to make laborious changes in the direc-
tion of its march. Therefore, lor much of the
delay which occurred there were good reasons ;
but not for all. Sir George Brown liad been di-
rected on the night of the 10th to advance on the
morrow at seven o'clock, and he imagined — it h
eti-ange if he, of all men, with his great knowledge
30 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
c H A P. of such things, was wrong upon a point of military
. '. usage — he imagined that the order would be re-
peated in the morn-ng, and heAvaited accordingly.
Also the Englisli troops moved slowly. Time was
growing to be of high worth, and from causes which
justified a good deal, though not quite all, of their
delay, the English at this time were behindhand.
In order that the operations of the day might
be adjusted to the time which the English army
required, orders were sent forward suspending for
a while the advance of Bosquet's column ; and at
nine o'clock the main body of the French army
came to a halt, and cooked their coffee. Whilst
they rested, our troops, by moving obliquely to-
wards their right, were slowly overcoming the
distance which divided them from tlie French left,
and were at the same time working their way
through the angle which measured their diverg-
ence from the line of march.
Of those composing an armed force there arc
few who understand the hindrances which block
its progress; and naturally the French were vexed
by the delay which seemed to be caused by the
slowness of the English army. They, however,
conformed with great care to the tardiness of our
advance, and even allowed our army to gain upon
them ; for when the Allies reached the ground
which sloped down towards the Alma, the heads
of our leading columns were abreast of the French
skirmishei'S.*
• Lord Rnglan was amongst tliose who observed this fact, and
he stated it in a letter which is before me.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 31
Meanwhile tlie Allied steamers had been seek- CHAP.
ing opportunities for bringing their guns to bear, *
and at twenty minutes past ten they opened fire.*
One or two of their missiles, though at a very
long range, reached some of those liussian bat-
talions which stood posted in rear of the Telegraph.
At half-past eleven o'clock the English right
had got into direct contact with the Trench left,
and our Light and 2d Divisions were marching in
the same alignment as the 1st and 3d Divisions
of our French Allies.
Twice again there were protracted halts. The The last
last of these took place at a distance of about a Aiiics before
mile and a half from the banks of the Alma
From the spot where the forces were halted the
ground sloped gently down to the river's side ;
* Private MS. by Mr riomaine, the Judge-Advocate. I may
here say generally, to avoid repeated notes, that, whenever in
my account of this battle I speak of an event as happening at a
time stated with exactness, I do so on the authority of Romaine.
He was a man so gifted with long sight, as well as with power
of estimating numbers, and, though a civilian, was so thorouglily
apt for military business, that Lord Eaglan used at a later time
to call liim ' the eye of the army.' During the action he rode
an old hunter, steady enough to allow him to write without
quitting his saddle : so, whenever he observed a change in the
progress of the action, he took out his watch and pocket-book
and made at the minute the memoranda on which I rely. 1 am,
therefore, very certain that the spaces of time intervening be-
tween any two events spoken of in this precise way were ex-
actly those which I give ; but I liavo reason to think that the
watches of men in tlie dilferent caiups had been difrereutly set.
Uie bailie.
32 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CIIAP. apcl tliougli some men lay prostrate under the
. burning sun, with little thought except of fatigue,
there were others who keenly scanned the ground
before' them, well knowing that now at last the
long-expected conflict would begin. They could
make out the course of the river from the dark
belt of gardens and vineyards which marked its
banks ; and men with good eyes could descry a
slight seam running across a rising-ground beyond
the river, and could see, too, some dark squares
or oblongs, encroaching like small patches of cul-
ture upon the broad downs. The seam was the
Great liedoubt ; the square-looking marks that
stained the green sides of the hills vvere au army
in order of battle.
That 20th of September on the Alma was like
some remembered day of June in England, for the
sun was unclouded, and the soft breeze of the
morning had lulled to a breath at noontide, and
was creeping faintly along the hills. It was then
tliat in the Allied armies there occurred a singular
pause of sound — a pause so general as to have
been observed and remembered by many in re-
mote parts of the ground, and so marked that its
interruption by the mere neighing of an angry
horse seized the attention of thousands ; and
although this strange silence was the mere result
of weariness and chance, it seemed to carry a
meaning ; for it was now that, after near forty
years of peace, the great nations of Europe were
once more meeting for battle.
Even after the sailing of the expedition, the
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 33
troops had been followed by reports that the war, chap.
after all, would be stayed ; and the long, frequent '
halts, and the quiet of the armies on the sunny
slope, seemed to harmonise with the idea of dis-
belief in the coming of the long-promised fight
But in the midst of this repose Sir Colin Camp-
bell said to one of his officers, * This will be a good
' time for the men to get loose half their cart-
' ridges ; ' * and when the command travelled on
along the ranks of the Highlanders, it lit up the
faces of the men one after another, assuring them
that now at length, and after long expectance,
they indeed would go into action. They began
obeying the order, and with beaming joy, for they
came of a warlike race ; "j'et not without emotion
of a graver kind — they were young soldiers, new
to battle.
VI.
Lord Eaglan now crossed the front of Prince Meeting
Napoleon's Division in order to meet Marshal St st Amauii
Arnaud, whose guidon was seen coming towards iiagiau
our lines.-)- The two commanders rode forward
* The cartridges are delivered to each man iu a packet, and,
to avoid loss of time in preseueo of the enemy, a sufficient
number should be ' shaken loose ' before the troops are brought
into action.
t They had met before at about half-past nine, but the Rus-
sian cavalry had not then quitted the heights, and they were
obliged to postpone their reconnaissance.
When tlio Marshal got near, he was cheered by the English
soldiery. Pleased with the compliment, he lifted his hat, and
said (speaking in English and with only a slight accent) —
' Hurrah for Old England ! '
VOL. in. 0
34 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, together, inclining towards tlieir left. No one
^' was with them. They rode on till they came to
one of those mounds or tumuli, of which there
were many on the steppe. From that spot they
scrutinised the enemy's position with their field-
glasses.
At this interview no change was made in that
portion of the plan which determined that the
French should turn the enemy's left ; but the part
to be taken by the English was still in question,
and St Arnaud threw out or revived the idea of a
flank movement by the English on the enemy's
right.* Lord Kaglan, however, now gazed upon
the real ground which the French counsellors of
the night before had striven to scan in their im-
aginations, and, having an eye for country, he
must have begun to see the truth. He must have
begun to see that the French, hugging the sea-
shore, and pouring two-fifths of their whole force
against the undefended part of the opposite heights,
would not only fail to confront the whole Russian
army in the way promised by the sketch, but
would in reality confront only a small portion of
it, leaving to the English the duty of facing the
enemy along two-thirds of their whole front. Of
a certainty he did not entertain for a moment the
idea of making a flank attack, but it was not
according to his nature to explain to men their
errors, and it seems he spoke so little that St
Arnaud did not yet know what the English
General would do;* but presently, Sir George
• fnferreil from what follows.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 36
Brown rode up and joined tlie two chiefs. Then CHAP.
the Marshal, closing his telescope, turned to 1_
Lord Eaglan and asked him ' whether he would
' turn the position or attack it in front ? ' Lord
liaglan's answer was to the effect, that, ' with
' such a body of cavalry as the enemy had
' in the plain, he would not attempt to turn the
' position.' *
Whilst the chiefs were still side by side, it
being now one o'clock, the advance sounded along
the lines, and the French and the English armies
moved forward close abreast. The Marshal then
rode off towards his centre.
VIL
The orders for the advance were sent forward Bosquet's
to Bosquet ; and, as soon as they reached him, he
threw out skirmishers and moved forward in two
columns. His right column was the brigade com- He uividos
manded by General Bouat ; the left column was
Auteniarre's brigade. IMoving with its regiments
in column at section distance, each brigade was
followed by its share of the artillery belonging to
the Division ; and Bouat's brigade was followed
by the whole of the Turkish Division except two
battalions. Towards Bosquet's left, but far in his
rear, there moved forward the 1st Division under
* This — heard and recorded in writing by Sir George Brown
— disposes of the notion which seems to liave been really en-
tertained by many of the French — the notion that Lord Raglan
stood engaged to turn the enemy's right.
36 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. Canrobert, and the od Division under Prince Napo
• leon. These two divisions advanced in the same
alignment. The 4th Division, under General
J^'orey, marched in rear of the 1st and 3d Divi-
sions, and two Turkish battalions escorted the
baggage.
Disjiositiou The formation of Canrobcrt's and Prince Napo-
boayot' Icon's Divisions was upon two lines. The first
Uie French i-ip ,,... • r ^ ^ ^ i
army. brigade of each division was in Iront and deployed
into a line of columns, whilst the second brigade
of each division followed the first brigade, and
was massed with the regiments in column at
section distance.
The 4th French Division marched in the same
order as the 1st and 3d Divisions, except that its
leading brigade was not deployed. The artillery
of each division was enfolded between its two
brigades,
oftheEiig- On the immediate left of the French, Sir De
lisli army. . .
Lacy Evans advanced with his 2d Division ; and
being close alongside of Prince Napoleon's troops,
he caused his own men to adopt a similar order
of march. He Avas followed by Sir Pdchard Eng-
land with our 3d Division in column. The bat-
teries belonging to each of these divisions inarched
on its right or inner flank.
Immediately on Sir De Lacy's left, the Light
Division, preceded by Colonel Lawrence with a
wing of the 2d Rille battalion in skirmishing order,
moved forward under Sir George Brown.* The
* In former Editions I was led into the mistake of substitut-
ing the name of Major Norcott for that of Colonel Lawrence, bj
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 37
Division was in dou1)le. column of" compimies from ciiAP,
tlie centre, and had the front and left flank covered ^'
by riflemen in extended order. It was supported
by the 1st Division undertime Duke of Cambridge,
and that in turn was followed by the 4th Division*
under Sir George Cathcart. Sir George Cathcart,
however, in accordance with a suggestion made
by himself, was authorised to take ground to liis
left, and place liis force in ^clielon to the 1st ]Jivi-
sion. The head of his column was al)renst of the
rear companies of the 1st Division.
Tlie three great infantry columns thus com-
posing the left wing of our army were covered
what I must call the erroneous wording of Sir George Brown's
Report to Lord Raglan. I say 'erroneous,' because, though
Sir George Brown docs not, in terms, deny that the right wing
of tlie 2d battalion of Rifles was fighting in front of his Division,
he suppresses all mention of its achievements, and this in a
despatch which gives a prominent place to the operations of the
left wing under Major Norcott. In excuse for the error into
which I was led by tn;sting too implicitly to Sir George Brown's
Report, I may say that Lord Raglan also trusted to it, and was
obviously misled by it into the adoption of the same mistake ;
for although we now know that Lawrence and the men of the
right T^-ing were among the foremost of those who stormed the
redoubt, Lord Raglan— seeing no mention of this in Sir George
Brown's Report, and observing that Sir George specially spoke
of jMajor Norcott's wing as taking part with the 23d Regiment
in the capture of the redoubt — was induced to speak of the aid
given by Jlajor Norcott and the left wing of the Rifles, without
speaking at all of the right wing, which was also taking a fore-
most part in the storming of the redoubt, under the orders of
Colonel Lawrence.
* Minus the 63d and some companies of the J 6th, left under
the command of General Ton-ens at the place of disembarkation.
The force actually with Sir George Cathcart during the action
consisted of the 20th, 21st, and 57tli Regiments, the 1st battal-
ion of Rifles, and Townsend's battery.
*32 ?S0
38 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, in front, left flank, and rear, by riflemen in ex-
[ tended order, and by tlie cavalry. The battery
belonging to each division marched on its right
or inner flank.
Bat Colonel Lawrence with his riflemen soon
got on so far in advance as to provoke a fire from
the Eussian skirmishers then swarming in the
vineyards below, and some rifle-balls sliot from
that quarter came droyjping into the ground near
the column formed by the Light Division. Almost
at the same moment, the artillerymen on the
Russian heights began to try their range ; and
although the air was so clear that our men could
see and watch the flight of the cannon-balls, it
seemed prudent for our leading divisions to go
into line. Those divisions, therefore, were halted,
and their deployment immediately began.
Tiie leading In deploying, Sir I)e Lacy Evans, being pressed
the KngHsh upou by PHnce Napoleon's Division on his right,
i'Mt'o\i'iie'' "^ was compelled to take ground to his left, and
to encroach upon a part of the space which Sir
George Brown had expected to occupy with his
Division.
Tiie Light The deployment of the Light Division was
on its ngiit eff'ected by each regiment with beautiful pre-
cision,* but, unhappily, the Division was not on
its right ground.
Sir George Brown was near-sighted, and had
* The deplnj'ment was upon the two centre compaiiips of tlie
division. "Wliilst the movement was proceeding, one man, a
sergeant, was killed by a rifle-ball. This was probably the first
death in our lines.
groiitiil.
BATTLE OF THE Al.MA. 39
not accustomed himself to repair the defect, as cHAP
some coniniauders have done, by a constant and .*. .
well-practised use of glasses; and, on the other
hand, tlie very fire and energy of his nature, and
his almost violent sense of duty, prevented him
from getting into the liabit of trusting to the eyes
of other men. For liours in the early morning
the Division had been wearied by liaving to
incline towards its right. At half-past eleven
the effort was reversed, and the Division then
laboured to take ground to its left ; but in that
last direction it had not taken ground enough.
Lord Kaglan, with his quick eye, had seen tho
fault, and sent an order* to have it corrected.
Not content with this, he soon after rode up to
the Division, and, failing to see Sir George Brown
at the moment, told Codiington that the Division
nmst take more ground to the left. Then, un-
happily, when he had uttered the very words
which would have thrown the British army into
its true array, and averted much evil. Lord Eaglan
was checked by his ruling foible. He had already
sent the order to the divisional general, and he
could not bear to pain or embarrass him by press-
ing the execution of it upon one of his brigadiers;
so he recalled his wholesome words, f The Divi-
sion failed to take ground enough to the left ;
and when the deployment was complete. Sir
George Brown had the grief of seeing his right
• Colonel Lysoiis carried it.
■^ I derive my knowledge from an officer who heard Lord
Raglan's words.
40 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, regiment (the 7tli, tlie Royal Fusiliers) overlapped
^' by tlie left — nay, even by the centre — of Penne-
fatlicr's brigade.* The fault was not retrieved,
and we sliall see it embarrassing the dispositions
that liad to be made for advancing in order of
battle.
The artillery attached to our two leading
divisions was now also drawn up in line, and
Sir George Brown reckoned that he alone showed
a front extending to nearly a mile.
At the same time, the Duke of Cambridge,
at Sir George Brown's request, altered the forma-
tion of his Division by distributing it into a
line of contiguous quarter-distance columns.
The march Tliese cliangcs having been completed, the
English army resumed its march ; and the lead-
ing divisions coming more closely within range,
and being a little galled by the enemy's fire, Sir
George Brown halted, and tried the experiment
of wheeling into open column. Afterwards, how-
ever, he returned to the line-formation, and in
that order continued his advance. i*
VIII.
So now the whole Allied armies, hiding nothing
* When the deiiloyinent took place, tlie 7th, the Eoyal
Fusiliers, were in rear of the 95th Regiment ; and they after-
wards, as will he seen, marched through it.
t My knowledge respecting the movements and evolutions
of our infantiy divisions is derived mainly from original ]\ISS.
in my possession, written by Sir George Bi-own, the Duke o/
Cambridge, Sir De Lacy Evans, and Sir George Cathcart
continued.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 41
of llieir splendour and their strength, descended CHAP.
slowly into the valley; and the ground on the '—.
right hank of the river is so even and so gentle
in its slope, and on the left hank so commanding,
that every man of the invaders conld he seen from
the opposite heights.
The Eussian officers had heen accustomed all spedacie
presenteil tn
their days to military inspections and vast reviews, tiicRussuins
but they now saw before them that very thing vanceofthc
for the confronting of which their lives had been
one long rehearsal. They saw a European army
coming down in order of battle — an army arrayed
in no spirit of mimicry and not at all meant to
aid their endless study of tactics, but honestly
marching against them, with a mind to carry
their heights and take their lives. And gazing
with keen and critical eyes upon this array of
strangers, whose homes were in lands far away,
they looked upon a phenomenon A^-hich raised
their curiosity and their wonder, and which
promised, too, to throw some new light on a
notion they had lately been forming.
The whole anxiety of Prince Mentschikoff had
been for his right. If he could hold the main
Pass, and scare the Allies from all endeavour to
turn his right flank, he believed himself safe ; and
it had been clear long ago that his conflict in this
part of the field would be with the English. It
was therefore the more useful to try to spread
amongst the Uussian troops an idea that the
English, all-powerful at sea, were thoroughly
worthless as soldiers.
42 BA.TTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. The working of this little cheat had been
• liitherto aided by circumstance. With the force
which'ti.e Wilder Mentschikoff there were two battalions of
foMiers h.vi l'i»ssian seamen — men belonging to those valiant
tl?''p"toruin crews of the Black Sea fleet which were destined
uliVlfrmy^ to maintain the glory of the Russian arms in the
bitterest hours of trial, when the land-forces
seemed to desert them — but partly from their
want of precision in manoeuvring, partly from
their sailor-like whims, and partly, no doubt,
from the mere fact of their being a small and
peculiar minority, they had become a standing
subject of merriment to the rest of the troops.
The Russian soldiery, therefore, were prepared to
receive tales assuring them that the bodies of
red-coats now discernible in the distance were,
all of them, battalions of sailors, against whom
they might well have their laugh as they had
at their own naval comrades. This idea had
fastened so well upon the mind of the Russian
army, tliat before the battle began, it was
shared by some of the more illiterate of the
officers, and even, it was said, in one instance
by a general of division.
Surprise at ^ut tlic siglit uow watclicd with keen eyes from
ii!eEMgHs°i the enemy's heights was one which seemed to
have some bearing upon the rumour that the
English were powerless in a land engagement.
The French and the Turks were in the deep,
croM'ded masses which every soldier of the Czar
had been accustomed to look upon as the forma-
tions needed for battle ; but, to the astonishment
anay.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 43
of the Ptussian officers, tlie leading divisions of the chap.
men in red were massed in no sort of column, and ^'
were clearly seen coming on in a slender line — a
line only two deep, yet extending far from cast to
west. They could not believe that with so fine a
thread as that the English General was really in-
tending to confront their massive columns.* Yet
the English troops had no idea that their forma-
tion was so singular as to be strange in the eyes
of military Europe. Wars long past had taught
them that they were gifted with the power of
fighting in this order, and it was as a matter of
course that, upon coming within range, they had
gone at once into line.
Meanwhile, the war-steamers — eight French Firo from
and one English — had pushed forward along the ring"''
shore in single file, moving somewhat in advance
of the land - forces ; and now, at twenty - five
minutes past one o'clock, the leading vessels
opened fire against the four guns at the village of
Ulukul Aides, and again tried the skill of their
gunners upon the distant masses of infantry ^hich
occupied the Telegraph Height and the low flat
ledge at its base. This last part of the cannonade
from the ships was followed by a change of no
small moment in the Eussian fi-ont of battle.
Convinced that his chief had been guilty of a followed by
grievous error in placing the Taroutine and the movenSu'
militia battalions on this low narrow ledge, troops con-
General Kiriakoff, who commanded in this part Freuch.
of the field, had tried by indirect means to pro-
* Chodajiiewicz.
44 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, cure a cliange of plan, but had ncit ventured
' to say anything on the subject to Prince
Mentschikoff himself. It is plain, however, that
Kiriakoffs opinion, getting abroad, was adopted
by the officers of these two corps ; for first, the
militia battalions, and then the battalions of the
Taroutine corps, without orders, and without hav-
ing been assailed or touched (except perhaps by
a chance shot or two at very long range from the
shipping), began a retrograde movement, and slow-
ly ascended the steep hill till they gained a more
commanding position at no great distance from
the Telegraph. No effort was made to check this
seemingly spontaneous movement.*
IX.
naif-i.ast At half-past one o'clock a round-shot from the
'jiic o'clock. . , . , . . , I
omiioiiade oppositc heights Came ripping the ground near
against the Loi'd Raglau, and it marked the opening of the
lOii-lish line. n ' f O
battle between the contending land-forces ; for
thenceforth, the enemy's fire was continuous.
He directed a steady cannonade against the
English line. At first no one fell ; but presently
an artilleryman riding in front of his gun bent
forward his head, handled the reins with a con-
vulsive grasp, and then, uttering a loud inarti-
culate sound, fell dead. The general peace of
* General Kiriakoffs statement, confirmed bj' Eomaine, wlio
observed and noted the movement. Tlie General tlioiir;ht the
change of position rc([nisite ; hut he admits that a retrograde
movement of this kind, just before the commencement of the
battle, was a grave eviL
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 45
Europe had continued so long, that to many chap.
men the si-dit was a new one ; and of the '
young soldiers who stood near, some imagined
that their comrade had fallen down in a sudden
fit; for they hardly yet hncw that for the most
part, in modern warfare, death comes as though
sent by blind chance, no one knows from whence
or from whom.
Since the enemy's artillery fire had now become AUai of our
brisk, our leading infantry divisions were halted, siousor-
1 1 1 • 1 n n (Icred to lie
and the men ordered to lie down, boon alter- down,
wards, it was found that the 1st Division had also The First
come within range, and it was then forthwith depioyt-a
thrown into line. In preparing for this man-
oeuvre, the Duke of Cambridge took care that
ground should not be wanting. Both on his right
and on his left he took more ground than had been
occupied by the division which marched in his
front. Whilst the Light Division in his front
was jammed in and entangled with the 2d Division,
the Duke had the happiness of seeing his Guards
and Highlanders well extended, and competent to
act along the whole length of that superb line.
The effect of this deployment was, that the ex-
treme right of the Duke's line became a force
operating in support of the 2d Division, and that
a part of his Highland Brigade, reaching much
further eastward than the extreme left of the
Light Division, became in that part of the field
the true front of the British line. AVhen this
manoeuvre v,;is completed, tlie men of the 1st
Division hiv down.
46 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
C H A P. Observing the extent of ground occupied by the
' first Division, Lord Ifaglan at once saw that the
Ei'i.'Unui'*"^ 3d Division would not have room to manoeuvre
sup'iwtuie i'l tlii^ same alignment with the Duke of Cam-
GuarJs. bridge. He therefore ordered Sir Eichard Eng-
land to support the Guards. It was this, or some
other order sent nearly at the same time, which,
for some reason, good or fanciful. Lord Eaglan
chose to have carried quietly. The directions
had been given, and the aide-de-camp was whirl-
ing round his charger, in order to take a swift
flight with the message, when Lord Eaglan
stopped him, and said, ' Go quietly; don't gallop.'
He knew he was, so to speak, in the presence of
Eussian commanders, and seemed to like that
whenever the enemy pointed a field-glass towards
the English headquarters he should look upon a
scene of tranquillity and leisure.
Our batteries tried their range, but without
effect, and they ceased to fire, reserving their
strength for the time when they would come to
close quarters.
The batteries on the Telegraph Height did not
yet open fire upon the French colunnis.
Lord Eaglan conceived that the operation deter-
mined upon by the French ought to take full
effect before he engaged the English army in an
assaidt upon the enemy's heights ; and perhaps,
if the whole body of the Allies had been one
people under the command of one general, their
advance would have been effected in Echelon, with
the left held back for some time, whilst the
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 47
effort ou the riglit was in progress ; but the pride chap.
of nations must sometimes be suffered to deflect "
the course of armies ; and although there was no
military value in any of the ground north of the
vineyards, Lord Ifaglan, it seems, did not like to
withhold his infantry whilst the French were
executing their forward movement. Since our
soldiers lay facing downwards upon the smooth
slope which looked against the enemy's batteries,
they were seen, every man of them, from head to
foot, by the Kussian artillerymen, and they drew
upon themselves a studious fire from apparently
about thirty guns.
Thus the first trial our men underwent in the Firennde?
action was a trial ot passive, enduring courage, "len wiuist
They had to lie down, with no duty to perform,
except the duty of being motionless ; and they
made it their pastime to watch the play of the
engines worked for their destruction — to watch
the jet of smoke — the flash — the short, moment-
ous interval — and then, happily and most often,
the twang through the air above, and the welcome
sound of the shot at length imbedded in the
earth. But sometimes, without knowing whence
it came, a man would suddenly know the feel of a
rushing blast and a mighty shock, and would find
himself besjiattered with the brains of the com-
rade who had just been speaking to him, "When
this happened, two of the comrades of the man
killed would get up and gently lift the quiver-
ing body, carry it a few paces in roar of the line,
then quietly return to their rank's, and again lie
48 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, down.* This sort of trial is well borne by our
! troops. They are so framed by nature, that, if only
they know clearly what they liave to do, or to leave
undone, tliey are pleased and animated, nay, even
soothed, by a little danger. For, besides that
they love strife, they love the arbitrament of
chance ; and a game where death is the forfeit
has a strange, gloomy charm for them. Among
the guns ranged on the opposite heights to take
his life a man would single out his favourite,
and make it feminine for the sake of endearment.
There was hardly perhaps a gun in the Great
Eedoubt which failed to be called by some cor-
rupt variation of 'Mary' or 'Elizabeth.' It was
plain that our infantry could be in a kindly
humour whilst lying down under fire. They did
not perhaps like the duty so well as an animat-
ing charge with the bayonet; but if they were
to be judged from their demeanour, they pre
ferred it to a church parade. They were ic
their most gracious temper. Often, when an
officer rode past them, they would give him the
fruit of their steady and protracted view, and
advise him to move a little on one side or the
other to avoid a coming shot. And this the
men would do, though they themselves, how-
ever well their quickened sight might warn them
of the coming shot, lay riveted to the earth by
duty.
* Casualties of this sort were going on here and there along
our line, but the exact incident described in t'le text wa^
observed in the 30th Rogiment.
BATTLK OF TIIK ALMA. 49
The recumbent postiu'c of our infantry threw in- c H A P.
to strong prominence the figure of every mounted l_
man who rode along their lines ; but the group of
horsemen composing or following the Headquarter
Staff was so marked by the white flowing plumes
of the ofhcers, that at a distance of a mile and a
half it was a conspicuous object to the naked eye;
and a Eussian artilleryman at the Causeway bat-
teries could make out, with a common field-glass,
that of the two or three officers generally riding
abreast at the head of the plumed cavalcade, there
was one, in a dark blue frock, whose right arm
hung ending in an empty sleeve. In trutii, Lord cannonade
Raglan, at this time, was so often standing still, against L<.r.'
or else was riding along the line of our prostrate iiis^statr."
infantry at so leisurely a pace, that he and the
group about him could not fail to become a
mark for the Russian artillery. The enemy did
not, as it seemed, begin this effort malignantly ;
and at first, perhaps, he had no further thouglit
than that of subjecting the English Head-
quarters to an ordinary cannonade, and forcing
them to choose a more retired ground for their
surveys.
Still, as might be expected, the Eussian artil-
lerymen could not easily brook the conclusion
that, v/hilst the English General chose to remain
under tlieir eyes and within range, it was beyond
the power of their skill to bend him from his
path, or even, as it seemed, to break the thread
VOL. III. J)
50 BATTLE OF THE ALJIA.
UHAP. of his conversation; so, at length growing ear-
L nest, they opened fire upon the group from a
great number of guns — but in vain, for none of
the Staff at this time were struck. Failing with
round-shot, the enemy tried shells — shells witli
the fuses so cut as to burst them in the air a lit-
tle above the white plumes. This method was
tried so industriously and with so much skill,
that a few feet over the heads of Lord Eaglan
and those around him there was kept up for a
long time an almost constant bursting of shells.
Sometimes the missiles came singly, and some-
times in so thick a flight that several would be
exploding nearly at the same moment, or briskly
one after the other, right and left, and all around.
The fragments of the shells, when they burst, tore
their shrill way down from above, harshly sawing
the air ; and when the novice heard the rush of
the shattered missile along his right ear, and then
along his left, and imagined that he felt the wind
of another fragment of shell come rasping the
cloth on his shoulders almost at the same mo-
ment, it seemed to him hardly possible that the
iron shower would leave one man of the group
untouched. But the truth is, that a fragment of
shell rending the air with its jagged edges may
sound much nearer than it is. None of the Staff
were wounded at this time.
Some of the suite were half vexed and half
angry ; for they knew tlie value of their chief's
life, and they conceived that he was affronting
great risk without due motive, and from mere
BATTLH OF THE ALMA. 51
inattention to danger. The storm of missiles gener- chap.
ally fell most thickly when Lord Eaglan happened '
to be riding near the great road ; for the encniiy,
having got the range at that point, always lab-
oured to make the bursting of his shells coincide
with the moment ^^hen our Headquarters were
passing. Tiii.s soon came to be understood, and
thencefortli, Avhen the Headquarter group were
tioiniz to cross the Causeway, thev rode at it
briskly, as at a leap, and spanned it witli one or
two strides, thus leaving tlie prepared storm of
shells to burst a little behind them. This effort
of the ItLissian artillery against Lord IJaglan and
the group surrounding him lasted a long time,
and was carried on upon a scale better propor-
tioned to the destruction of a whole division than
to the mere object of warning off a score of horse-
men. If the fire thus expended had been brought
to bear on Pennefather's brigade, it might have
maimed the English line in a vital part of the
(ield.
XL
The time was now come when the Allies could TheAiiies
eouM now
measure their front with the enemy s position, mpasure
It will be remembered that the plan* proposed witiitiiatof
'■ '^ '■ tlie enemy:
the night before by Marshal St Arnaud rested
upon the assumption that tlie whole of the
enemy's forces except two or three battalions
would be confronted by the French army, and
that, therefore, the only opportunity for important
* See the fac-siniile.
52
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
C H A 1
I
service whicli the English army could find would
_ be that of making a great flank-move/nent against
the enemy's right; but, there being by this time
a certainty that no more than a moderate portion
the bearing of the Russiau army would be met by the French,
this admea- • , n ti ■ • -,■
suremeut it lollowed tliat by Simply providing a line oi
battle with which to confront face to face the rest
had upon
tlie French
phin.
of the enemy's forces, Lord liaglan would secure
i'or his troops an ample field of duty ; and now
that the invading armies had come within cannon-
shot range, it began to be seen that the entire
front presented by the 1st and 3d French Divi-
sions, and by our 2d and Light Divisions, would
be only just commensurate with the length of
the position which the Russian commander was
occupying.
Russian Army.
English Arniv.
Tlie French Arm v.
Tlie ground
wliich each
of the lead-
ing divisions
had to
assail.
Of course, therefore, if Lord Eaglan had not
already rejected the French plan of a flank at-
tack by our forces, it would have now fallen to
the ground. It had never made any impression
on his mind.*
* I infer this from the fact tliat those with whom Lord Rag-
\a\\ was thoronglily coulidential in such matters never heard
liim speak of it. Lord Eaghm, as we saw, distinctly and fin-
ally rejected the plan at the close of his interview with St
Arnaud. It became a plan simply preposterous as soon as it
was apparent that St Arnaud would not confront any part o!
the Russian army except theii" left wing ; for to mate two
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 53
The Allies were now so close to the enemy's chap.
position that the General of each of the five lead- ^'
ing divisions could form a judgment as to the
particular sphere of action which awaited him.
To Bosquet the advance against the West Cliff
had long ago been assigned. Canrobert faced
towards the White Homestead and those spurs of
the Telegraph Height which lie towards the west.
Prince Napoleon confronted the centre and the
eastern steeps of the T(;k'graph Height. Sir De
Lacy Evans with the 2d JJivision faced the vil-
lage of Bourliouk; and it seemed at this time that
his left would not reach further up the river's
bank than the bridge, for Sir George Brown had
been reckoning that his first or right briuade
would be charged with the duty of attacking
the enemy's position across the great I'oad, and
that it would be his left, or BuUer's brigade,
which would assail the Great Eedoubt.
The Generals of the five leading Divisions were
thus directing their forces, and already the swarms
of .skirmishers thrown forward by the French, and
the thinner chains of riflemen in advance of our
divisions, were drawing close to the vineyards,
and beginning their combats with the enemy'.s
flidik-iiiovpniciits, one against tlie enemy's lel't and llic other
against his right, and to do this without liaving any force
wherewith to confront the enemy's centre, woukl have been a
]ihan requiring no comment to show its absurdity. The FrencJi
accounts, whcllicr official or qunM official, liave always persisted
in saying that Lord Ragli^n had engaged, and afterwards failed
to make, a movement on the enemy's riglit flank. This is the
cnly reason why the matter re{][uires anything like careful
elucidation.
54 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, sliarpshooters ; but then, and with a suddenness
^' so strange as to suggest the idea of some pyro-
TiicviUase techuic contrivance, the whole village of Bour-
M'ton'fireby liouk, exccpt the straggling houses which skirted
it towards the east, became wrapped in tall
flames.* No man could live in that confla-
gration ; and the result was, that in one minute
a third of the ground on which the English army
had meant to operate was, as it were, blotted out
of the field. If this firing of the village took
place under the orders of the Paissian commander
it was the most sagacious of all the steps he took
that day ; for his gravest source of care was the
want of troops sufficing for the whole extent of
tlie position at wliich he grasped, and therefore
an operation which took away a large part of
the battlefield was of great advantage to him.
The effect Our infantry were immediately thrown into
mcasme'iLi trouble. The Light Division, as we saw, did
the English not take ground enough on the left, and the fir-
ing of the village now cut short our front on the
right. Sir De Lacy Evans, thus robbed of space,
was obliged to keep his second brigade in rear of
the first, and even then he continued to overlap
the right of the Light Division.
The smoke from the burning village was de-
pressed and gently turned towards the bridge by
* General de Todleben says that the materials for burning
the village had been previously collected ; and besides the
great number of haystacks, and the peculiar nature of the hay,
were causes accounting for the extreme swiftness of the confla-
gration. The hay of that country is full of stiff prickly stems,
which resist compression, and so leave ample room for air.
BATTLE OF Till-: ALMA. 56
the faint breeze which came from tlic sea. There, chap.
for hours, in a long fallen pillar of cloud, it lay
singularly firm and compact, obscuring the view
of those who were near it, but not at all staining
the air in any other part of the field,
XII.
The operations of the great column entrusted General
to General Bosquet now began to take effect. °^^^^
Bosquet Avas a man in the prime of life. Ten
years of struggle and frequent enterprise in Al-
geria had carried him from the rank of a lieu-
tenant to the rank of a general officer ; * and he
was charged on this day, not only with the com-
mand of his own — the 2d — Division, but witli the
command of the troops which formed the Turkish
Contingent. The whole column under his orders
numbered about 14,000 men. The Arabs and
Kabyles of Algeria, tliough men of a fierce and
brave nature, and prone to petty strife, are so
wanting in the power of making war with effect,
that, as far as concerns the art of fighting, they can
scarcely be said to have given much schooling to
the bold and skilful soldiery of France ; but the
deserts, the broad solitudes, and the great moun-
tain-ranges of Xorthern Africa, have inured the
French army to some of those military toils
which are next in worth to the business of the
actual combat ; and for Bosquet, the hero of
• A brigadier; and now, at the time of the Crimean war, he
was a general of division.
66 ISATTLK f)r TTIR ALMA.
CHAP, many a struggle in tlio passes of the INIiddle
^' and the Lesser Atlas, it was no new problem to
have to cross a stream and carry a bod}' of troops
to the summit of a hill with a steep-looking face.
In the morning, he had ridden forward escorted
by a few Spahis, to reconnoitre the ground with
his own eyes; and thus, and by the aid of the
careful surveys effected by the naval men, he was
able to assure himself, not only that the river
could be passed at its bar, but that troops there
crossing it would be likely to find the means of
getting round and ascending to the summit of the
cliff from the south-west. Examining also the
face of the cliff further inland, he saw that the
broken ground opposite to the village of Almata-
mack could be easily ascended by foot-soldiers ;
and he also, no doubt, perceived that the road
leading up from the village (unless it should
prove to have been effectually cut or guarded
by the enemy) would give him a passage for his
His plan of artillery. Upon these observations Bosquet based
operatioi\3.
his plan. He resolved to march in person with
Autemarre's brigade upon the village of Almata-
• mack, there to cross the river, and afterwards
endeavour to ascend the plateau at the point
where the road from Almatamack goes up be-
tween the West Cliff and the Telegraph Height -,
but he ordered General Bouat, with his brigade
and with the Turkish Contingent, to incline far
away towards his right, to try to pass the river at
its bar, and then to find the best means he could
for getting his troops uj) the cliff.
IJATTLE OF -niK ALMA. 57
The two bodies of troops imder ]josquet's com- chap
mand began their diverging movement at the ^'
same time ; and before two o'clock the swarms of ^^-lyanreof
' Auteinarre
sMrmishers which covered the front of the col- ""et'"Jn°"*"
umns were pnshing their way through the village i"^''*''"-
of Almatamack, and the vineyards on eitlier side
of it. A few moments more and thov were firiiifr
with a briskness and vivacity which warmed the
blood of the many tlionsaiuls of hearers then new
to war. One of our officers, kindling a little with
the excitement thus roused, and impatient, per-
haps, that the Fi'encli should be in action before
our people, could not help drawing J.ord IJaglan's
attention to the firing on our right. But the stir
of French skirmishers through thick ground was
no new music to Lord Fitzroy Somerset ; rather,
perhaps, it recalled him for a moment to old times
in Estrcmadura and Castile, when, at the side of
the great Wellesley, he learned the brisk ways of
Napoleon's infantry. So, when the young officer
said, ' Tlie French, my lord, are warmly engaged,'
Lord Raglan answered. 'Are they? I cannot
* catch any return-fire.' His practised ear had
told him what we now know to be the truth. No
troops were opposed to the advance of Bosquet's
columns in this part of the field ; but it is the
custom of French skirmishers, when they get into
thick ground near an enemy, to be continually
firing. They do this partly to show the chiefs
behind them what progress they are making, and
partly, it would seem, in order to give life and
spirit to the field of battle.
58 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. When General Bonat reached tlie bank of the
^' river, he found that the bar of sand at its mouth
uli'dTtaci^ed ^^t^e it possible for his men to keep good their
Bouat""'^'"^ footing against the waves flowing in from the
sea ; and in process of time, witli all his infantry,
including tlie Turkish battalions, he succeeded in
gaining the left bank of the river. He could not>
however, carry across his artillery, and he there-
fore sent it back witli orders to follow the march
of Autemarre's brigade.
Wlien he reached the left bank of the river,
Bouat found an opening in the cliff before him,
whicli promised to give liim means of ascent.
Into this opening he threw some skirmishers, and
these, encountering no enemy, were followed by
the main body of the brigade, and by tlie Turkish
battalions. Pursuing the course thus opened to
him, Bouat slowly crept forward with his col-
umn, and wound his way up and round towards
the summit of the cliff. But it was only by
marching upon a very narrow front that he was
able to effect this movement ; and it was not until
a late period of the action that he was able to show
himself in force upon the plateau. Even then he
was without artillery. The troops under his com-
mand had not an opportunity of engaging in any
combat with the enemy because they marched
upon that part of tlie heights M-hich the Eussian
General had determined to leave unoccupied.
Further Meanwhile Bosquet, marching in person with
Autemarre's Autcmarre's brigade, traversed the village of Alma-
Ijrigade. i p , i , .
tamack, forded the river at ten minutes past two
BATTLH OF THE ALMA. 59
o'clock, and immediately be^^au to ascend tlic road CHAP.
leading up to the plateau. The road, he found, _1_
was uninjured, and guarded by no troops. His
artillery l)cgan the ascent ; and nieanwliile tlie
keen and active Zouaves, impatient of the winding
road, climbed the heights by .shorter and steeper
patlis, and so swiftly, that our sailors, looking
from the ships (men accustomed to perpendicular
racing), were loud in their praise of the briskness
with whicli the Frenchmen rushed up and
'manned' the cliff. As yet, liowever, Bosquet
had encountered no enemy.
It has been seen that the position taken up by Guns
Prince Mentschikoff fell short of the sea-shore by agai.rsti.im
- . , , from Uliika
a distance of more than two miles, and tliat he auics.
was not in military occupation of the cliff, now
ascended by I'osquet with Autemarre's brigade ;
but also it will be remembered that, at the village
in rear of the cliff, called Ulukul Akles, there had
been posted some days before one of the ' Minsk '
battalions of infantry, with four pieces of light
artillery, and that the detachment had there re-
mained. These four guns were now brought out
of the village, and after a time were placed
in battery at a spot near the village of Ulukul
Tiouets, and within range of the point where
the Zouaves were beginning to crown the summit
of the cliff. The ' :Minsk ' battalion at this time
could not be discerned by the French ; but, on
the cliff overlooking the beach, there were seen a
few squadrons of horse.
As soon as a whole battalion of Zouaves liad
60
BATTLE OF TIIK ALICIA.
CHAP.
I.
Bosquet,
after a
inomeiitary
cliGck, cs-
t,'il>lislics
Iiimsplf on
tlic cliff.
.Measures
l:iken by
Kiriakoff
upon ob-
.scrving Bos-
quet'.s tuni-
iug uiovc-
iiicnt.
gained tlic summit, tliey were drawn up and
formed on tlie plateau. No shot was as 3'et fired
by the enemy ; and General Bosquet, with his
staff, ascended a tumulus or mound on tlie top of
the cliff", in order to reconnoitre the ground.
IMcanwhile, his artillery was coming u}), and
the first two of Ids guns had just reached tlie
summit when one of the carriages In-oke down.
This accident embarrassed the rest of the column,
and whilst the hindrance lasted, tlie enemy opened
fire from his four guns.* Coinciding as it did
with the breaking down of the gun-carriage, this
fire produced for the moment an ill effect u])on
the head of the French column, and one of its
battalions fell l)ack nnder the shelter of tlie ac-
clivity. But lliis check did not last. Tlie road
blocked by the broken-down gun-carriage was
quickly cleared, the guns were moved up I'apidly,
and swarms of skirmishers pressed up in all
directions. Then the troops which were already
on the summit moved forward, and lodged tiiem-
selves upon a part of the plateau a little in ad-
vance of the steep by whieli they had ascended, "f*
As soon as he began to hear guns in tlie direc-
tion of tlie West Cliff, Kiriakoff took from his
reserves two of his ' jMoscow ' battalions, and
])Osted them, the one low down and the other
* Half of the T^o. 4 hatteiy of the ITth brigade of tlie Pius-
sian artillery.
+ Sir Edward Oolebrooke saw this operation from the deck
of one of our ships of war, and describes it very well in his
memorial. He was a skilful and very accurate observer of
military movements.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 61
higher up, on that part of the hill which looked chap
down upon the Wliite Homestead. He also J
brought up his artillery to the slopes of the Tele-
graph Height, placing some of the guns in bat-
tery with front towards the sea, so as to command,
though at a long range, the part of the plateau
which Bosquet crossed by the Hadji load. Kiria-
koff did not take upon himself to make any other
dispositions for dealing with the turning move-
ment which threatened his left.
Amoii<rst the French who were ^fvininff the Horsemen
... on the ulill
summit 01 tlie plateau, no one seems to have
divined the reason why a little body of Kussian
horsemen should have made its appearance on
the cliff" overlooking the sea, nor why, without
attempting hostile action, it had tenaciously clung
to the ground. Those troopers were the attend-
ants of a man in great trouble. They were the
escort of Prince Mentschikoff.
XIII.
The enemy's survey of the allied armies had Tiie effect of
been so carelessly made, and had been so little tunlln^' '^
directed towards the sea-shore, that Bosquet, it upon tiio
, . , „ iiiinJ of
seems, had already "ot near to the river before PnneeMcut
his movement was perceived, rrince Mentschi-
koff, with Gortschakoff and Kvetzinski at his
side, had been standing on the Kourgane Hill
watching the advance of the English army, and
giving bold orders for its reception ; but presently
he was told that a French division was advancing
62 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, towards the unoccupied cliff on his extreme left.
• At first, lie was so shocked by the dislocation
which his ideas would have to undergo if his left
flank were indeed to be turned, that he had no
refuge for his confusion except in mere disbelief,
and he angrily refused to give faith to the unwel-
come tidings.* For days, he had been on the
ground which he himself had chosen for the great
struggle ; but he was so certain that he had
effectually learnt its character by glancing at its
(general features, that he had not, it seems, had
the industry to ride over it, nor even to find out
the roads by which the villagers were accustomed
to ascend the heights with their waggons.
He seems to have imagined it to be impossible
that ground so steep as the cliff had appeared to
be could be ascended by troops at any point west-
ward of the Telegraph Height; but when at
length he was compelled to know that the French
and the Turks were marching in force towards the
mouth of the river, his mind underwent so great
a revulsion, that, having hitherto taken no
thought for his left, he now seemed to have no
care for any other part of the position. In his
place, a general, calm, skilful, and conscious of
knowing the ground, might have seen the turning
movement of the French and the Turks with un-
speakable joy ; but instead of tranquilly regard-
ing the whole field of battle under the new aspect
which was given to it by this manoeuvre, he only
laboured to see how best lie could imitate tlie
* Chodasiewicz.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 63
mistake of his adversary — how best he could sliift ciI A P.
his strength to the distant unoccupied clifl" which ._!.._
was threatened by Bosquet's advance. The na-
ture of the ground enabled him to make lateral
movements in his line without much fear of dis-
turbance from the Allies ; and as soon as he saw his med-
that the French were detaching two-fifths of their dealing
army in order to turn his flank, lie wildly deter- ms fl.tr.k
. „ . march.
mined to engage a portion of his scanty force m
a march from his right hand to his left — in a
march which would take him far to the westward
of his chosen ground. For this purpose he
snatched two batteries from his great Eeserve and
also two from his right, gave orders that he was
to be followed by the four ' Moscow ' battalions
which were the reserve of his left wing, and by
the three ' Minsk ' battalions which formed part of
his 'Great Reserve,' and then with four squa-
drons of hussars rode off towards the sea.*
It was certain that a long time would elapse Ments.i.i-
° '- kolf on the
before the troops engaged in this vain journey cutr.
could be expected to get into action with Bosquet;
and, meanwhile, the power of the whole force en-
ca<Ted in the flank movement was neutralised.
But that was not all. Prince Mentschikoff's
mind was so strangely subverted by the sensation
of having his left turned, that, although a long
* The Latteries which Prince Jlentsehikoif thus drew from
his Great Reserve were, the 10-guii light battery, No. 5, and
the 8-gun troop of Horse-artillery, No. 12 ; whilst the two he
took from liis right were the two 8-gau Don Cossack Latteries,
one of wliich was a Lattery of position, the other a light
battery.
64 RATTLK OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, time must needs pass before he could be iu force
' oil the West Cliff, he yet could not endure to be
personally absent from the ground to which he
now fastened his thoughts. So when, with his
Staff and the horsemen of his escort, he had got
to the ground overlooking the sea, near the
village of Ulukul Tiouets, and had seen the first
groups of the Zouaves peering up on the crest of
the hill, he still remained where he was. "Whilst
he sat in his saddle, the appearance of his escort
drew fire from the shii)ping, and four of his suite
were struck down ; but the Prince would not move.
It is likely that the fire assuaged the pain of his
thoughts.
Hisbaiieries At tliis time, it would seem, he gave either no
at length ■, p i • t i • i • i
coming up, orders, or none oi a kind supplying real guidance
there begins ... - _ . . , ,
a cannonade lor liis gencrals. Lingering upon the ground
between his ., ,, ,, ii- in j_ii
and Bos- without troops at hand, he impotently watched
quel's artil- ,. i , > ^ • ^ tt- t i i
U:ry. the progress ot Autemarres brigade. His liglit
batteries soon came up ; but neitlier these nor
the squadrons of Hussars which formed his escort
were the best of implements for pushing back
General Bosquet into the steep mountain-road by
which he had ascended; and in the hands of
Prince Mentschikoff they were simply powerless.
Howev(;r, his guns, when they came up, were
placed iu battery, and Bosquet's guns being now
on the plateau, there began a cannonade at long
range between the twelve guns of the Prench and
the whole of the light artillery Avhich Prince
Mentschikoff had hurried into this part of the
field. At the same time the French artillery drew,
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 65
some shots from the distant guns which Kiriukoff chap.
had placed looking seaward on the Telegraph L^
Height ; and the annals of the French artillery
record with pride that the twelve pieces which
Bosquet brought up with him engaged and over- uosquet
powered no less thau forty of the enemy's guns, hi'mseif.
Nor is this statement altogether without some-
tliing like a basis of trutli, for the Russians had
now thirty-six pieces of artillery on the West
Cliff, or tlio Telegrapli lieiglit ; * and though
most of them at this time were so placed that
their gunners could attempt some shots at a more
or less long range against Bosquet's guns, the
French artillerymen not only held their ground
without having a gun disabled, but soon pushed
forward their batteries to a more commanding
part of the plateau.
By this time, the seven battalions of infantry
which Prince Mentschikoff had been moving
flank -wise were very near to the spot where
their General had been eagerly awaiting them;
but when at last, after agonies of impatience,
he was about to have these troops in hand, the
Prince seems to have come to the conclusion
that, after all, he could do nothing in the part
of the field to which he had dragged them. He
was brought, perhaps, to this belief by seeing that
the French and the Turks, who had been crossing
the river at its mouth, were now beginning to
show their strength towaids the westernmost part
* Tliey had that number even u[)on tlie supposition that the
heavy 8-gun battery of the Don Cossacks had not yet come up.
VOL. UL E
66
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP.
I.
Mentschi-
koff counter-
aiarching.
Position of
Bosquet on
tlie cliff.
of the cliff; for he may not have known that this
force, being without artillery, could be easily pre-
vented from advancing against his batteries on
the open plateau. At all events, Prince Ments-
chikoff now thought it necessary to reverse his
flank -movement, and to travel back towards his
centre with all the forces which he had brouglit
from thence to his left.
But when the Prince began this last counter-
movement, lie was already beginning to fall under
the dominion of events in another part of the field.
Bosquet now stood undisturbed on the part of
tiie plateau which he had reached. But he was
not without grounds for deep anxiety. It did not
fall to his lot on that day to be engaged in any
conflict except with the enemy's artillery ; but,
from the moment when lie began to establish
himself on the plateau until towards the close of
the action, he was in a dangerously isolated posi-
tion, for he had no troops around him except
Autemarre's brigade; and, until the action was
near its end, he got no effective support either
from Bouat on his right or from Canrobert on his
left.
XIV.
As soon as Marshal St Arnaud perceived that
Bosquet would be able to gain the summit of the
cliff, he tried to give him the support towards his
left which his position, when he got established
on the cliff, would deeply need; and he deter-
mined that the time was come for the immediate
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 67
advance of Lis 1st and 3d Divisions. Addressing chap.
General Canrobert and Prince Napoleon, and giv- '
ing them the signal for the attack, he said, I am ordtrTihe
told, these words : ' With men such as you I have crn'robeif
' no orders to give. I have but to point to the Na},oi""n*
'enemy!'* Hitherto these two French divi-
sions had been nearly in the same alignment
as the leading divisions of the English army ;
but now that they were ordered forward, leav-
ing the English army still halted, the true char-
acter of the movement to be undertaken by the
Allies was for the first time developed. Their The oni.r
array was to be what tacticians call 'an order ot theAiiic-s
' battle in three echelons by the right, the first
' dchelon making a turning movement.' +
Russian Army.
Knglish Army.
This disposition for the attack was not the result Lord Rat--
of any agreement made in words between Marshal Suon'of
St Arnaud and Lord Raglan. It resulted almost i.eVaYto
take.
• I have this from an officer wlio assures me tliat lie heard
the words.
t * Un ordre de bataille h, trois Echelons par la droite, le pre-
' mier echelon attaquant par le flanc' These are the words in
which a staff officer present in the action, and very high in the
French service, has described to me the advance of the Allies.
Bee the diagram, a much better guide than mere words.
68 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
naturally, if so one may speak, from Bosquet's
turiiing movenieut, from the extent of the front
which the enemy was now seen to present, and
from the character of the ground. Just as the
Marshal had kept back his 1st and 3d Divisions
till he saw that Bosquet could gain the height, so
Lord Eaglan, according to his conception at this
time, had to see whether Canrobert and Prince
Napoleon could establish themselves upon the
Telegraph Height, before he endangered the con-
tinuity of the order of battle by allowing the
English army to advance.
During the first forty minutes of the cannonade
directed against the English infantry, there had
been no corresponding fire upon the left of the
Artiiieiy Frencli ; but artillery missiles discharged from
twi'finUie the Telegraph Heights, and passing over the
Russian and , . nii n^ i- ii •^■ • ^
the French hcads 01 the iaroutuie and the nnlitia bat-
talions, now began to molest the divisions which
were led by Canrobert and Prince Napoleon.
On the other hand, the artillery belonging to
the Divisions of Canrobert and Prince Napoleon
came down to a convenient ground above the
edge of the vineyards, and opened fire upon the
columns of the 'militia' battalions, now posted
much farther up than before on the opposite
height. And with effect ; for although the range
did not admit of great slaughter, some men were
struck, and the rest, though they did not yet
move, began to be displeased with the grouud
on which they stood.'*
* Chodasiewicz.
batteries.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 69
The swarms of skirmishers which the French cUAP.
threw forward went briskly into the cover, forded . :
the river, and then made tliemselves at home
in the broken ground at the foot of the Telegraph
Height. When tlie soldier is upon service of this
kind, his natural character, neutralised in general
by organisation, is often seen to reassert itself.
One man, prying eagerly forward, would labour
to get shots at liussian sharpshooters still linger-
ing near the river; another would sit down, take
out his little store of food and drink, and be
glad to engage with any one who passed him in
something like cynical talk concerning the pastime
of war. Pnit, upon the whole, French skirmishers
push on with great boldness and skill.
When the foremost ranks of Caurobert's massed camobafa
, advance
battalions had entered tlie vineyards, each man across lue
. . river.
got through as best he could, and rapidly crossed
the river ; and though, during part of the advance,
the troops were under the fire of the guns on the
Telegraph Height, yet tlie nature of the acclivity
before them was of such a kind that the further his trooj.s
.,, , , Pii li •ire sheltered
thev advanced (provided the heads oi the bat- from fire i.y
the stecii-
talions did not show themselves on the plateau nessofthe
liill-side.
above the broken ground), the better they were
covered from fire. And, except some lingering
skirmishers, they had no infantry opposed to
them at this time ; for the two ' Moscow ' bat-
talions which Kiriakoff had sent down towards
the ford of the White Homestead were now, it
seems, made to take part in the marches and
counter-marches which Mentscliikoff was direct-
70 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, ing in person, and there were then no otiier
' Russian columns in tliis part of the field.* So,
when the head of Canrobert's Division gained the
broken ground on the Russian side of the river,
it was for the moment sheltered ; but if it had
then ascended above the broken ground so as to
peer up over the crest and face the open plateau
at the top, it would not only have come under
tlie fire of artillery, but would liave before it the
four battalions of militiamen, supported by the
four Taroutine battalions.
For an army advancing to the attack, a rim
of sheltered ground on the verge of the enemy's
position is of infinite use, because it enables the
assailants to make without hurry their final
arrangements for the assault ; but to troops which
are not propelled by the decisive order of some
resolute commander, such shelter as tlmt is some-
times a snare, because it tempts men to hang
back. In such a situation the best troops will
often abstain from going forward of their own
accord ; for it seems, to officers and men, that if
* Tliere is some grouiul for supposing tliat the second 'Mos-
'cow' battalion was for a while forgotten, and that, not re-
ceiving in due time the order to rejoin the other Lattalions of
the corps, it was left alone in the ravine till it found itself
opposed to Canrobert's whole division. If this is the case, and
if there resulted anything which could be called a combat
between tlie Russian battalion and the French Division, the
statement that Canrobert was not met by any troops except
slcirniishers would have to be qualified. The statement of
Ciiodasiewicz on this point receives no support from Kiriakoff,
and that is the reason why I have not adopted it. Chodasiewic2
did not belong to the 'Moscow' corps.
BATTLK OF THE ALMA. 71
they arc to quit good shelter and t^o out into the ciiap.
storm, they ought, at the least, to know that '
the movement is one really intended, and is |,'*,g%'^o^the
needful to the purpose of the battle. The duty ITuTiT'
of pressing forward to terminate the isolation of nl'vilion.
Bosquet rested primarily with the General of the
1st Division.
General Canrobert was a man of whom great General
hopes were entertained. According to every test
which could be applied by school and college
examinations, he promised to be an accomplished
general. To the military studies of his youth he
had added the experience of many campaigns in
Africa ; and even in the French army, where
brave men abound, his personal valour had be-
come a subject of remark. He was so deeply
trusted by his Emperor, that he had become the
bearer of a then secret paper which was to put
him at the head of the French army in the event
of St Arnaud's death. He had the misfortune to
have upon his hands the blood of the Parisians
slain by his brigade on the 4th of December ; but
it was said, to his honour, that he, more than all
the other generals employed at that time, had
loathed the work of having to abet the midnight
seizure of his country's foremost generals. His
spirit, they say, had been broken by the pestilence
which some few weeks before had come upon his
Division in the country of the Danube ; but the
extremity of the grief to which he then gave way
had so much to justify it in the appalling nature
of the calamity which slew his troops, that it
72 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, was not a conclusive proof of liis being wanting
' in military composure. The most successful of
respondents to school and college questions now
had to undergo a new test. Commanding a fine
French division, he had the head of his column
close under a height occupied by the enemy, and
this at a time when the isolated condition of a
French brigade on his right seemed to make it
a business of great moment for him to be able to
bring support to his comrades.
But at the point where Canrobert faced the
height he found it impracticable to drag up
artillery, and he was obliged to send his guns all
the way down to the village of Almatamack, in
order that tliey might tliere ford the river and
ascend to the top of the plateau by tlie road
His which Bosquet had taken. This operation could
dilemma. . i i /-. i ,
not but take a long time ; and what Canrobert
was now called upon to determine was, whether
he would wait until his artillery had completed
its circuitous and difficult journey or at once
carry forward his infantry to the summit of the
plateau and engage the battalions there posted.
He determined to wait. The maxims of the
French army discourage the idea of bringing
infantry into action upon open ground ^^■itllout
the support of avtillery ; and Canrobert did not,
it seems, conceive that the predicament in wliich
Bosquet stood was a circumstance which dispensed
him from the observance of a general rule. So,
whilst he was thus waiting for his artillery, he
did not deem it right to push forward his battal-
BATTLi: OF TIIK ALMA. 73
ions on the open plateau, hut he hvouglit the liead chap.
of his Division to a point high up on the steep '
broken side of the liill, and extended it, in single
and double battalion columns, on either side of tlie
track by which he had ascended. He spread him- Tiiemurse
liu takes.
self more towards his left than towards his right,
and did not move any of his battalions in such a
way as to be able to give a hand to Bosquet.
Prince Napoleon's Division hung back in the Pnnce
valley, and the bulk of it at this time was still on Division.
the north bank of the river.
Although the head of Canrobert's Division, Firesus-
,. , 11-1 T-n- • ^ t.linctl 1»V
benig under tlie heights on the liussian side oi the rear-'
, *" . . ^ - , , ward ]inr-
the river, was einovmg good shelter, the masses tionsof
' . , ' theFreiu'i
of troops which stood more towards the rear, in- columns,
eluding some of Canrobert's battalions and the
great bulk of Prince Napoleon's Division, were
exposed to the fire of the guns on the Telegraph
Height. They suffered : and a feeliiiff of dis- Discourati;
couragement began to spread.
Marshal St Arnaud had understood the gravity
of the danger which would result from any delay
in the advance of his centre, but to meet it he
used an ill-chosen safeguard. The way to send
help to Bosquet was to give Canrobert due war-
rant to move up at ones upon the plateau, whether
with or without his artillery.* "What the ]\Iar-
* If the objoctioi) to ailvancing on the plateau witliout artil-
lery was, according to Freneii ideas, insuperable, an eflort, one
would think, should have been made to push forward Prince
Napoleon's Division. Prince Napoleon had in his front two
roads leading up to the Telegraph, and one of these, at the
least, was practicable (and was afterwards used) for artillery.
74
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
C II A P.
I.
St Arnaiicl
pushes for-
ward his
reserves.
The ill
effect, of
tl'.is lii^suie
ui>oii the
French
troops.
Their com-
jilaint that
tliey were
being 'iiias-
' sacred.'
Anxiety on
account of
Bosquet.
Btate of
tlie battle
ht this time
shal did, however, was to order up his reserves,
sending one brigade of his 4th Division to follow
the march of Bosquet, and the otlier to support
Canrobert. This last measure was actually a
source of weakness rather tlian of strength ; for,
as far as numbers were concerned, Canrobert and
Prince ISTapoleou were already in more than ample
strength. With two superb divisions, numbering
some 15,000 men, and having Bosquet and Bouat
on their right with many thousands more, they
^\"ere advancing upon a very narrow front; and
the bringing up of fresh troops augmented the
masses who came under the fire of the guns with-
out at all propelHng the leading divisions. So
the evil lasted and increased. Inaction in the
midst of a battle is hateful to the brave, impetu-
ous Frenchman, and inaction under fire is intoler-
able to him. The troops towards the rear of the
columns, not having the close presence of the
enemy to animate them, and being without that
shelter from the Russian guns which was enjoyed
by the leading battalions, became discontented
and uneasy. It was then that there sprang up
among the French troops the ill-omened complaint
that they were being ' massacred.'
All this while, Bosquet was on the summit of
the cliff with his one brigade ; and his isolation,
as we shall presently see, was becoming a source
of great anxiety.
Minute after minute aides-de-camp were coming
to Lord Raglan with these gloomy tidings ; and,
iu truth, the action at this time was going ou ill
BATTLE OF TIIH ALMA. 75
for tlie Allies. Tlie duty of ci'owuing the West CIIAP.
Clifi'had been fulfilled with great spirit and de-
spatch by a small body of men ; but the step had
not been followed np. Bouat, filing slowly round
near the sea with some nine thousand men, but
without guns, was for the time annulled. Bos-
quet, with one brigade, stood halted upon the
heights which he had climbed ; and though,
lia])pily, he had not been assailed by infantry, his
advanced and isolated position had become a
source of weakness to the Allies. Of the two
French divisions charged with the duty of attack-
ing the front and western flank of the Telegraph
Hill, the one had its foremost battalions high up
the steep and on the verge of the open ground at
its top, whilst the other M'as all do^^•n in the
valley ; but (although in different ways, and for
different reasons) these divisions were both hang-
ing back, and no French force had hitherto at-
tacked any part of the ground held by the
enemy's formed battalions. Meanwhile the bat-
teries still swept the smooth approach to the
table-land wdiere the Telegraph stood, and not
only kept it free of all assailants, but, pouring
tlieir fire over the heads of their own soldiery,
were able to throw plunging shots into the midst
of Prince Napoleon's Division.
All this while, the English army had been kept
under the fire of the Paissian artillery ; and al-
though the men had been ordered to lie down, the
ground, sloping towards the river, yielded no
shelter, and many ha-d been killed and wounded.
76 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. At first, our batteries replied ; but after a while
' it bad been ascertained that the advantage the
enemy had in his commanding ground was too
great to be overcome, and the English artillery
had ceased to fire. Lord Eaglan asked why this
was : * I observe,' said he, ' the enemy's six-pound-
* ers amongst us ; why cannot we send our nine-
* pounders amongst them?' But he was told
that our fire had proved to be ineffectual, and
that it was therefore discontinued. He seemed
struck. Perhaps the answer which he had re-
ceived became one of the grounds on which, a
few minutes later, he resolved to change tlie face
of the battle.
XV.
opiioituni- For some time, the course of the action had
toMents- bccu offering to the Eussian General an oppor-
tunity of striking a great blow ; and, circum-
stanced as he M'as, it would have been easier for
him to gain a signal victory before three o'clock,
than to stand on the defensive and hold his
ground till sunset. The English forces, confront-
ing as they did a position of great natural
strength, and having their left on ground as open
as a race-course, would have been hampered in
every attempt to storm the Great Redoubt if their
flank had been assiduously threatened, and now
and then charged, by the enemy's powerful
cavalry. Therefore, if Mentschikoff, checking
the English forces by a vigorous use of his horse-
men, had undertaken at this time such an advance
jrliikoff.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 77
against Canrobert's Division as was afterwards en a P.
• 1
successfully executed by Kiriakoff, he would have L._
fouud the French battalions quite soft to his touch
by reason of their want of artillery ; * and Can-
robert's retreat from the verge of the plateau
would have occurred at a time when half the
Fi'ench army was so far from the true scene of
conflict as to be unable to give the least help.
Except by reckoning broadly upon the quality of
the French and the British troops, or else upon
the smiles of fortune, it is hard to see how the
Allies could then have escaped a disaster.
But men move so blindly in the complex busi-
ness of war, that often, very often, it is the enemy
himself who is the best repairer of their faults.
It was so that day. During the precious hour
in which the liussian forces might have wrought
a way to great glory, their cavalry were suffered
to remain in idleness, and the battalions which
formed the instrument afterwards used for strik-
ing the blow were marching in vain from east to
west and from west to east. The torpor and the
false moves of the enemy countervailed the short-
conn"ngs of the Allies.
No combat of any moment was going on at this Tiie battle
time. It is true that Colonel Lawrence with the langufshed.
right, and Major Norcott with the left wing of the
2d battalion of the liifle Brigade, had gone into
the vineyards in front "f of our Light Division.
* I should not have ventured upon tliis sentence if it weie
not that I am warranted in doing so by wliat actually occurred
a little later. See pud.
f During the march, as was shown in a former note, M^jor
78 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. But everywhere else, the battle tlagged. The
' men of our infantry divisions, thongh under artil-
lery fire, still lay passive upon the ground. Our
cavalry awaited orders ; our artillery declined to
fire without being able to strike ; the Russian
and the French still exchanged their fire at long
range. No French battalion advanced above the
broken ground, though, covering their front and
the left flank of their trailing columns, swarms
of skirmishers were alive. Of these some were
firing to show where they were, some duelling
with the Russian riflemen who yet remained in the
valley ; others ascended the knolls and vexed any
Russians they saw with long, careful shots ; others,
again, sat down and contentedly took their rest.
This languishing of the battle seemed to pro-
mise ill for the Allies. They had undertaken to
assault the enemy's left, and to that enterprise
they stood committed, for they had drawn away
from the real field of battle to the West Cliff
some fourteen thousand men. Yet since the mo-
ment when Bosquet began to ascend the cliff,
more than forty minutes had elapsed, and nothing
had yet been done to win a result from his move-
ment, nor even to give him that support which
he very grievously wanted. Both from Bouat on
his right and from Canrobert on his left he was
divided by a wide tract of ground.
Hitherto, then, the operations planned and
Norcott had been on the flank of the Division ; but when the
battle opened, he began to operate in front of BuUer's brigade.
— Note to ith Edition.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 79
undertaken by the French had not only done CHAP.
nothing towards carrying the position, but had ^
even brought tlie Allies into danger.
The causes of tlie miscarriage were, — the physi- causes
cal obstructions which hindered both Buuat and ocias'ion^
Canrobert from bringing up their guns wiih them, of u.e ""
and the stiffness of the objection which prevents operatiom
French Generals from engaging their infantry on
open ground without the support of artillery.
According to the intended plan of operations,
Bosquet, after gaining the cliff with his whole
column of some 14,000 men, was to bring round
his right shoulder in order to fall upon the flank
of the Ptussians ; and, simultaneously with his
appearance on the plateau, a vigorous and resol-
ute onslaught was to be made by the rest of the
French army npon the front of the enemy's left
wing. But Bosquet, as we saw, though he was
personally present on the part of the plateau
overhanging Almatamack, had only one brigade
there ; and whether he looked to Bouat on his
right, or to Canrobert on his left, he looked in
either case to a general who, though he had
masses of infantry, was without artillery, and he
therefore looked in vain. In such circumstances
the utmost that Bosquet could be expected to do
was to hold his ground, — and this he did.
XVI.
For an hour and a half the Allies had lain
under fire without even becjinuinff to assail the
80 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, enemy's formed battalions. The only ground
' gained was that occupied by Bosquet ; but, Bos-
quet's achievement not having been followed up,
his very success now threatened to bring disaster
upon the Allies. When a Prench soldier is one
of a body placed in a false position, he knows it,
and comments on the fact ; and the very force
and vivacity of his nature make it difficult to
keep him long upon ground to which he feels a
A (lesi.oiid- scientific objection. A French aide-de-camp came
iiil; account, .
of uosquL'fs ill haste to Lord Eaguin, and represented tliat un-
condition .
is iiruugiit less something could be done to support or relieve
to L(jrd ^ -•- ^
Hngiaii. Bosquet's column it would be 'compromised.'*
* Exactly the same pressure had just been applied by the
French Marshal to Sir Dc Lacy Evans. In his published letter
of the 28th of June 1855, Evans writes : ' On the arrival of the
' 2d Division in front of the village of Bourliouk, which, having
' been prepared for conflagration by the Russians, became
' suddenly for some hundred yards an impenetrable blaze,
' JIajor Claremont came to me in great haste, to say from the
' ilarshal, that a part of the French arm}', having ascended the
' heights on the south of the river, became threatened by large
' bodies of Russians, and might become compromif-ed unless
' the attention of the enemy were immediately drawn away by
' pressing them in our front. I made instant dispositions to
' conform to this wish, sending at the same time, as was my
' duty, an officer of my Staft' (Colonel Herbert) to Lord Eaglan,
' who was then a short distance in our rear, for his Lordship's
' approval, which was instantly granted.' From the recurrence
of the word 'compromised,' and from the coincidence in point
of time, one is led to infer that the message given in the text
and the message conveyed to Lord Raglan through General
Evans may have been one and the same. Tliere is nothing
that I know of to interfere witli this conclusion, if it be sup-
posed that Major Claremont was accompanied ])y a French
aide-de-camp, who rode first to General Evans, and from him
to Lord Raglan. — Note to 4:th Edition.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 81
Gifted liimself witli tlio conunand of graceful CIIAP.
diction, Lord IJaglan was iKjt witiiout fastidious ;
prejudices against particular forms of expression,
and it chanced that he bore a singular hatred
against the French word which we translate into
' compromised.' So lie archly resolved to have
the meaning of the word fully expanded into
plain French, and he asked the aide-de-camp
what would be the actual effect upon the brigade
of its being ' compromised.'
The answer was, * It will retreat.' *
Was it time for the English General to take
the battle into his own hands?
So long as Bosquet, with Autemarre's brigade,
stood isolated upon the cliff, and Canrobert's and
Prince Napoleon's Divisions remained hanging
back in the vineyards and the broken ground
below the Telegraph height, an advance of our
ibrces would plainly distort the Allied line in a
hazardous way ; and Lord Eaglan liad watched for
the moment when the development of the expected
French attack on tlie Telegraph Height would war-
rant him in suffering our infantry to go forward.
But he had hitherto watched in vain ; and, not Loni Rag-
knowing how long the causes of the French de- to pred-
1 . 1 . I'itate the
lay might continue to operate, he resolved to advance of
1 /• • 1-111 "'^ Kiiglish
depart from the scheme of action which had army.
hitherto governed him, and to precipitate the
advance of the English forces. It is true that
while Bosquet stood halted on the cliff, whilst
Canrobcrt abstained from assailing the Telegraph
* ' 13attra cu retraite.'
VOL. in. F
82
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP.
I.
Grounds
tending to
cause, or
to justify,
the resolve.
Height, and wliilst Prince Napoleon's Division
was still low down in the valley, the advance of
the English forces against the Causeway and the
Kourgan6 Hill would ruin the symmetry of the
plan which the French had contrived ; and if
Bosquet should be obliged to retreat at a time
when the English were hotly engaged in an attack
upon the enemy's heights, the whole array of the
Allies would be brought into perih But the
timely incurring of dangers is proper to the busi-
ness of war ; and though the enemy had hitherto
been torpid and indulgent, the cause of the Allies
had fallen into such a plight, that a remedy which
involved heavy risks might nevertheless be the
right one. And, so far as concerned liis under-
standing with the French, Lord IJaglan was freed
from all care ; for he had been already assured
that Marshal St Arnaud anxiously desired him to
advance ; and one aide-de-camp, as we have seen,
had told him plainly that nothing less than a
diversion by the English forces would prevent
General Bosquet from retreating.
A man may weigh reasons against reasons, but
sometimes, after all, it is the power of the imagina-
tion, or else some manly passion, which comes to
strike the balance and lead him on to action.
The motive of which Lord Baglan felt the most
conscious was the simple and natural longing to
cease from being passive. He could no longer
endure to see our soldiery lying down without
resistance under the enemy's fire.*
• This is the motive for accelerating the advance of the
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 83
He had been riding slowly upon the ground chap.
between the Great Causeway and the left of the '
French army ; but he now stopped his horse, and order for
the cavalcade which had trailed in his wake of the ehk-
, ,, , . , lishinfiinliA
whilst he moved then gathered more closely
around him. There were altogether some twenty
horsemen ; and although with several of tliem
Lord Eaglan from time to time talked gaily, yet,
so far as concerned the duty of taking tliought
how best to conduct the action, he was like a
man riding in mere solitude ; for it was not his
custom to seek counsel, and the men around him
so held their chief in honour that none of them
would have liked to assail him with question or
advice. Still, any one there could see that, be-
sides Lord liaglan himself, there was one man of
the Headquarter Staff whose mind was engaged
in the business of the hour. We saw that General
Airey had already begun to wield great power in
the P]nglisli army. With the power was its bur-
then. Whilst most of the other men on the
Headquarter Staff seemed to be merely spectators
or messengers, there was care, vexing care, on the
lean, eager, imperious features of the Quarter-
master-General. He was not simply impatient of
the delay ; he judged it to be a great evil.
It was to him that Lord Eaglan now spoke
some five words. Whatever it was that was said,
it lit the face of the hearer, and turned his look
of care into sunshine. The horsemen in the sur-
Britisli troops wliich Lord Raglan avowed to nip on the evening
of tho action.
84 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, rounding group rose taller in their saddles, and
1 handled their reins like men whose limbs are
braced by the joy of passing from expectancy to
action. Every man, whether he had heard the words
or not, saw in the gladness of his neighbour's face
that the moment long awaited was come.
Our infantry was to advance. The order flew;
for it was Nolan — the impetuous Nolan — who
carried it to the 2d Division.* A few moments
later and the order had reached the Light Divi-
sion. The whole of the foremost English line from
the 47th liegiment on our right to the extreme
* My authority for this statement is the journal of poor
Nolan now lying before me. There, after stating tliat 'a
' general advance was ordered,' he says : 'To the 2d Division I
' carried the order myself, and in riding forward with the ad-
' vance brigade had my horse shot under me by a round-shot.'
On the other hand. General Evans, I think, conceives that he
got his warrant to advance when Colonel Herbert returned to
him with the message that Lord Raglan granted his request to
be allowed to accede to the prayer of the French Marshal. And
again, Colonel Lysons (who was Assistant Adjutant-General of
the 2d Division) states that he carried the order, and he adds
this spirited record of the emotion which impressed the fact
upon his memory : ' I could not be mistaken on this point ; I
' so well remember the excitement I felt as I galloped back to
' the 2d Division, and then went on to the light of the Light
' Division, passing tlie order along the line ; and I shall never
' forget the excited look of delight from each face as I repeated
'the words, "Tlie line will advance!"' It is evident that
both Nolan's and Colonel Lysons's statements arc correct ; and
I conceive that the inijiression which each of them entertained,
as well as the impression entertained by General Evans, may
be reconciled by supposing that the return of Colonel Herbert
to Evans's side preceded the arrival of the formal orders, and
that (either intentionally, or else from some mistake) the
carriage of tlie formal order was entvustrd to two StalT officers.
— Note to ith Edition.
15ATTLE OF THK ALMA. 85
left of the Light Division, rose alert from the chap.
ground, dressed well their ranks, and then, hav- '
ing a front of two miles with a depth of only two
men, marched grandly down the slope.*
XVII.
Sir De Lacy Evans, commanding the 2d Divi- Evans
1 1 1 p 1 • 1 • 1 detaches
sion, had before him the blazing village. In that Adams
' . . witli two
conflagration no man could live ; and in order to battalions,
° , , ' and with
make good his advance on either side of the flames, tl"^r'**:"'
^ his Divisu.n
he had split his force by detaching General Adams fi^'-i'-f ■•^^,
■>■ JO towards IL;
to his right with two regiments-f- and Turner's ^"'^o®
battery. With that force Adams, driving before
him some Eussian skirmishers, marched down
towards the ford which divided the French and
English armies. Evans himself, with four bat-
talions| and Franklin's battery of field-artillery, §
had to assail the defences which Prince Mentschi-
koflf had accumulated for the dominion of the Pass
and tlie great road. Soon, however, Evans was a
good deal strengthened in the artillery arm ; for
an opportunity of rendering service in this part
of the held was observed and seized by Captain
Anderson with a battery belonging to the Light
* Computing from the right of the -iTth Regiment, the Eng-
lish front was a little short of two miles ; but, computing it
from the ground on which Adams was advancing, the front was
more tlian two miles in extent.
t The 41st and 49th.
J The 1st brigade, under Pennefather, ;ind the 47th Regi-
ment, belonging to Adams's brig;ide.
§ Fitzmijyer commanded both this and Turner's battery.
86 BA.TTLE OF TllK ALMA.
CHAP. Division and by Colouel Dacres with a battery
^" belonging to the 1st Division. By the time that
tliG infantry had got down to near the enclosures,
eighteen English guns had begun to reply to the
fire whicli the enemy was pouring upon Penne-
father's brigade.
TheconHict But EvQu.s's taslv was a hard one. Having on
in wliich ,.., . ,, ,, , ■ ^ ^ •
lie became his right au impassable conilagration, and being
cramped towards his left by our Light Division,
he was forced to move along the unsheltered line
of the Great Causeway upon a narrow and crowded
front, and this under a converging fire of artillery;
for with the sixteen guns of the Causeway bat-
teries, with the eight other guns planted near, and
the heavy guns of position discharging their shot
and shell flankwise from the left shoulder of the
Great Eedoubt, the enemy swept the main road
and the bridge, and searched the fords both above
and below it. And whilst the enemy's batteries
thus dealt with the more open approaches to the
bridge, his infantry defended the ground which
could not be searched by round-shot, for, posted
in the covert on either side of the Causeway, there
were the four Borodino battalions ; * and, besides,
the companies of sappers, and of the 6th Eilles,
Avere operating in the vineyards below, and at tlie
bridge, whilst, moreover, there was a great portion
* There is some obscurity as to the operations of the Boro-
dino corjis. They were so placed as to become severed from the
actual control of their divisional general, and they were covered,
it seems, by the conflagration ; but all accounts agi'ce in stat-
ing that the Borodino corps was in tlie Pass, and close to the
great road.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 87
of the sixteen battalions posted on the slopes of chap.
the Kourgane Hill, which was near enough to be '. —
available for the defence of the Causeway as well
as the Great Redoubt. Moreover, the enemy's
reserves were so disposed as to be in close and
easy communication with this part of the field.
The Eussian skirmishers at this time were swarm-
ing in the thick oround which belts the river.
Confronting these defences, Evans strove to
work his way forward ; but although the walls
and enclosures on the skirts of the village here
and there formed islands of shelter, the rest of the
ground which had to be traversed was so bare,
that every man of the force passing over it came
under the eyes of the Paissian gunners ; and their
fire being therefore effective, Pennefather's brigade,
though always moving forward a little, could only
gain ground by degrees.
At times, when the balls were falling thickly,
the men sheltered themselves as well as they
could behind such little cover as the ground
afforded ; and when there came a lull, they sprang
forward and made for some shelter a little more
in advance. There were some buildings which
afforded good cover against grape and musketry ;
and some of the men, having gained this shelter
by a swift rush across the open ground under very
heavy fire, were slow to move out again into a
storm of grape, canister, and musket-balls. At a
later time, the enemy shattered the walls of these
buildings with round shot, and some of our men
were crushed or suffocated by the ruins ; but those
88 BATTJ.K OF TIIH ALMA.
CHAP, who died that poor death were nieu hanging
' back.
This kind of struggle did not of course allow
the troops to adhere to their order of formation ;
but whenever any number of men got together
upon ground which enabled them to extend, they
quickly fell into line, and this they did notwith-
standing that the groups thus instinctively hasten-
incr into their English formation were sometimes
men of different regiments. Several times the
men were ordered to lie down.
From some unexplained cause, it happened that
the Piussian Sappers wlio had been posted near
the bridge, moved off without having destroyed it.
The 47th Eegiment, pushing in between the
river and the burning village, and afterwards ford-
ing the stream a good way below the bridge, was
better sheltered from the fire of the Causeway
batteries than the regiments of Pennefather's
brigade.
Colonel Hoey of the 30th persistently worked
his men through the gardens and enclosures till
at length he was able to cross the river and estab-
lish his regiment under cover of the steep bank
on the Ptussian side of the stream. Thence, for
some time, he maintained a steady fire against the
gunners of the Causeway batteries.
The 95th, like the other regiments of the brigade,
stole forward from one sheltering spot to another;
and at one time three of its companies became
divided from the rest of the corps, and united
themselves in line with the 55th ; but the whole
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 89
regiment liad been again got togetlier, wlien, the CHAP.
Light Division coming on, it appeared tliat its right '
regiment was overlapped by the 95th. Lacy Yea
did notclioose to stop; and, the 95th being halted
at the time, he with his Eoyal Fusiliers passed
through it. But the ' Derbies ' could not endure to
be thus left behind, and soon the regiment rushed
forward, bearing so strongly towards the left that
the fortunes of the corps theucefortli became con-
nected with the exploits of Codrington's brigade.
The 55th Eegiment, whilst advancing in line
over open ground, came under so crushing a fire
that it staggered ; and, though the line did not
fall back, it was broken. But Colonel Warren
soon rallied his troops, and carried them forward.
Afterwards, when he reached a spot which yielded
shelter to a man lying flat on the ground, he
ordered his men to lie down ; but he himself kept
his saddle and remained steadfast in the centre of
his regiment until the moment returned when
acain he could lead it forward.
The kind of struggle in which Evans was en-
gaged could not be long maintained without in-
volving heavy loss. Evans liimself received a
severe contusion, and almost all his Staff were
struck ; for Percy Herbert, his Assistant Quarter-
master-General, was dangerously hit ; and Captain
Thompson, Ensign St Clair, and Captain A. M.
M'Donald were severely wounded. Of the officers
of the 30th, 55th, and 47th regiments, Major Eose,
Captain Schaw, and Lieutenant Luxmore were
killed. Colonel Warren was wounded, and so
90 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, were Pakenliam, Dickson, Conolly, Whimper,
■ Walker, Coats, Bissett, Armstrong, Lieutenants
Warren, Wollocombe, Philips, and Maycock.
Pennefather's brigade alone lost in killed and
wounded nearly one-fourth of its strength.
So long as the Causeway batteries swept the
mouth of the pass, Evans, with his three shattered
battalions,"!- could do no more than maintain an
obstinate and bloody combat iu this part of the
field, and gain grouiul by slow degrees. He was
not yet able to push forward beyond the left bank
of the river, and assail the enemy in the heart of
his position across the great road.
XVIII.
Advance of Qu Evaus's left, but entangled with some of his
iHvi^iSa. regiments. Sir George Brown moved forward with
the Light Division. He had before him the
Great Redoubt, armed with its twelve guns of heavy
calibre ; and this stronghold was flanked on its
right by the eight guns of the Lesser Ptedoubt, and
on its left by the eight-gun battery connecting this
part of the defences with the artillery and the
riirtaskii infantry which guarded the Pass. Upon the
higher slopes of the Kourgane Hill, and so posted
as to look down into the Great Eedoubt, there
was yet another battery of field-artillery, J
* This, as well as all other statements which I nial<e of casual-
ties in the Eiip,'lish army, is taken from the official returns.
+ The 30th, {iSth, and 47th Ilegiments. As to the 95th, see
J/OKt.
X This was the strengtii of the artillery on or closely adjoin-
i;iil liofore
It
BATILI': OF THE Al.MA. 91
EiglitGeii battalions of infantry* were still chap.
jtosted upon the slopes of the Kourgane Hill. Of
this force, the four Kazan battalions formed stood
in front near the shoulders of the Great Tiedoiibt,
and were supported by the four battalions of the
Vladimir corps. On the right — proper right — of
these troops, but somewhat refused, there were
two of the Sousdal battalions, whilst more in ad-
vance, and so placed as to form the extreme right
of the Russian infantry line, there were the two
remaining battalions of the same corps. Besides
the masses thus pushed forward. General Kvetz-
inski held in hand the four battalions of the Oug-
litz corps as an immediate reserve, and posted
them upon the higher slopes of the Kourgan^
Hill. On the right rear of these forces (after
having come in from their skirmishing) tliere
stood the two battalions of sailors. On the ex-
treme right, and massed in colunnis at intervals
upon the eastern and south-eastern slopes of the
Kourgan^ Hill, there were twelve squadrons of
regular cavalry, and eleven sotnias of Cossacks.f
These bodies of horsemen were so placed that,
whilst they covered the enemy's right and right
rear, the Russian commander could, so to speak,
ing tlie Kourgane Hill after the withdrawal of the two Don
Cossack batteries. — See Appendix No. I.
* The four Kazan (or Archduke Michael's) battalions, the
four Vladimir battalions, the four Sousdal battalions, and the
four Ouglitz battalions, with also the two battalions of sailors.
+ These bodies constituted the whole of tlie Russian cavalry
except the four squadrons which Prince Mentschikoff took with
hira when he rode towards the sea, and having numbered 3600
at the first they now reckoned 2700.
J.
92 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, swing tlioin round, and liurl tlicni again.si the iliink
" of an enemy as.sailing his position in front.
Again tlie troops which defended the Causeway
could aid the defence of the Kourganfe Hill ; and,
moreover, the four Volhynia battalions, which con-
stituted what was now left of Prince Mentschi-
koff's 'Great JJeserve,' were so placed that they
might he promptly brought forward in support to
the troops confronting our people.
It rested with the four Kazan battalions to
make the lirst attack upon the Englisli troops.
This was to be done whilst our soldiery, after
struggling through the fords, were gaining the top
of the bank. The enemy's massive columns were
to throw our men back into the channel of the
river before they could find time to form.*
The slope which led up from the top of the bank
to the parapet of the Great Redoid^t was almost
as even as the glacis of a fortress ; and, except to
one who knew beforehand how unaccountably life
and limb arc spared in a storm of artillery-fire, it
seemed hard to understand that upon that smooth
ground men would be able to live for many mo-
ments under round-shot, grape, and canister from
the twelve heavy guns they confronted.
* After speaking of the disposition of the Russian infantry
on the banks of the river, Prince Gortschakoff writes : ' These
' arrangements had been taken with a view to the unavoidable
' disorders amongst the enemy's lines when crossing the river,
' anil in order to throw the Allies backwaid by a violent shock.
' Orders had been issued to that effect by Prince Mentschikoff,
' and severally reported to the commanding generals under me,
' and by me.'
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 93
Being on the extreme left of the Allied forces, cilAi\
Sir G. Brown had to stand prepared for an attack .__^
of cavalry on his flank. On our side of the river,
home down to the edge of the vineyards, the
broad and gently undulating downs, thickly
clothed with elastic herbage, were all tliat horse-
men could wish for ; and even on the left bank, the
ground in this part of the field was practicable for
the evolutions of cavalry. Hardly ever in war
did 2700 troopers sit still in their saddles under
stronger provocation to enterprise, for they were
upon fair ground ; and, unless they submitted to
be forbidden by the body of only eight hundred
English horse, which stood in their pnth, for-
tune offered to let them ride down on the Hank
of a line of infantry, and strike it whilst in the
act of advancing to attack a field citadel.* So,
although in point of fact it occurred, the con-
tingency of the enemy's withholding his cavalry
arm, instead of bringing it down upon the unshel-
tered flank of his assailants, was hardly one that
beforehand oui' people could have deemed at all
probable, still less expected with confidence.
Rightly, therefore — though the apprehension
was not afterwards justified by the event — the
Light Division was carried into action with an
idea that cavalry charges were to be expected
on the flank ;-f- and the duty of preparing against
* The English cavuhy altogether had a strength of 1000 ; but
Lord George Paget's regiment was in anotlier part of the field.
+ Before the action, there was a good deal of conversation
aniong.st officers in the Light Division with respect to the way
in wliicli the expected charges of the liussian cavuliy shouH b«
rtSSiiilants.
94 BATTLE OF TUB ALMA.
CHAP, enterprises of this sort pressed specially upon
_._l! General ]3uller, because he conimandod the left
brigade.
To storm a position thus held in strength by
forces of all arms, and to answer at the same time
for the safety of the whole of the Allied army
against a flank attack, was a task of great mo-
ment ; but, on the other hand, Sir George Brown
was not without means for preparing a well-
Mcaus for Ordered assault — for the enemy was making no
well nideied attempt to liold the vineyards in strength ; and
assault were ,. ., oi iiii
npeii to the ou the Kussiau Side of the river, the bank, al-
though steep, and from eight to fifteen feet in
height, was yet so broken that a skirmisher seek-
ing to bring his eye and his rifle to a level with
the summit, would easily find a ledge for his foot.
Here, then, was exactly the kind of cover which
the assailants needed ; for if this steep bank could
be seized and lined for a few minutes by their
skirmishers, it would enable their main body to
recover its formation after passing through the
enclosures and fording the river. But in order to
lay hold of the advantage thus offered by the
nature of the ground, it was of necessity to take
care that the advance of the Light Division should
be amply covered by skirmishers. This was not
done. The Eifles under Lawrence and Norcott
had long before scoured the vineyards ; but they
met ; and it was then — then, perhaps, for the first time — that
men broached the idea of dispensing with the 'hollow square,'
and receiving tlie enemy's horse in line. At all events it was
tlicn, and amongst officers of the Royal Fusiliers, that I my.sel/
first heard the change mooted.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 95
had inclined away towards their left, and, fording chap.
the river higher up, had left Codringtou's brigade '
without any skirmishers to cover its advance.* The Division
- not covereJ
No other light-mfantry men were thrown lorward by suir-
" luishers.
in their stead, and the whole body went stark
on with bare front, driving full at the enemy's
stronghold.^
XIX.
Sir George Brown's right brigade, consisting of Tiie tenor
^ <=> <^ *-" of Sir G.
the Eoyal Fusiliers, the 33d and 23d Eegimentsj Brown's
•^ ' ox orders for
tlie advance
* The right wing -the wing under Lawrence — was the wing
which had had to advance in front of Codrington's brigade.
Lawrence found himself so baflled by the smoke of the burning
village, that he inclined away to his left, leaving Codrington's
front uncovered, and got at last to the front of the 19th Kegi-
ment.
+ Sir George Brown's omission to cause skirmishers to be
thrown out from the regiments of Codrington's and Buller's
brigades seems to have been caused by his imagining that the
necessity of the step would be effectually superseded by the
operations of the Rifle battalion. The event proved his error ;
but one would have thought that it might have been perceived
beforehand ; for, however well an independent body of rifle-
men may be led, and however important a share it may be
likely to have in governing the result of a battle, there is no
safe ground for anticipating that its operations will supply the
place of skirmishers thrown out from the formed battalions.
Indeed, it may be said that the more able and enterprising the
leader of an independent body of light infantry men may be,
the less his force will be likely to fulfil the peculiar duty of
companies thrown out from the formed battalions, and kept in
close relation with them by the link of that obedience -which a
captain owes to his colonel.
X When I speak of several regiments in the same limb of the
sentence, I generally follow the order in which they would be
ranged, going from right to left. In a brigade consisting cf
three regiments — say, e.g., of the 1st, 2d, and 3d Foot — the
96 BATTf-E OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, was under General Codrington. The left brigade,
.,_1^ consisting of the lOtli, tlie 88tli, and 77tli TJogi-
nients, was commanded by General ]3ullci'. Tlie
orders which General Codrington received from Sir
George were simply to advance with his brigade,
and not to stop until he had crossed the river.
A like order, it is believed, was given to General
Buller. The division still moved in line ; and,
after losing a few men from the fire of the enemy's
artillery, it reached the boundary of tlie vineyards
and gardens which Ijelt the course of the river.
Tlie advance The euclosurcs by this time had been almost
vmeyfi'is;"' entirely cleared of Russian skirmishers by our
Rifles under Lawrence and Norcott, but could be
searched by artillery fire. In their eagerness
for the conflict, our regiments strove to advance
quickly ; but it was a laborious task to traverse
the gardens and vineyards, and many of those
who had hitherto kept their knapsacks here laid
them down. In a few minutes, the whole of the
Light Division of infantry, drawing along with it,
in its impetuous course, the 95th Regiment, had
forced a way into the vineyards. There, our
young soldiers found themselves, as they imag-
ined, in a thick storm of shot and cannon-l)alls ;
but it seems that missiles of war fly crashing so
audibly through foliage that they sound more
dangerous than they are.
1st would be posted at the right, the 3d in the cenUe, and the
2d on the left. So if one wished to speak of those three regi-
ments in the order in which they would stand when ranged in
the same battalion, one would take them from right to left, and
in this order — viz., 1st Foot, 3d Foot, 2d Foot.
IJATTLE OF THE ALMA. 97
The loss at this time was not great. Our men chap.
were in the belief that speed was required of '
them ; and having before them no chain of skir-
mishers to feel the way and control the pace of
the Division, they struggled forward with eager
haste. In passing from one of the enclosures to
another, part of the line came to the top of a
vertical bank, revetted witli stone, and forming a
kind of 'sunk fence.' Standing there, the men
observed that a violent gust of shot was beating
in against the stone work at their feet ; and it
seemed to them that, the moment they sprang
from the top of the fence to the lower vineyard,
their legs would be shattered by a thousand mis-
siles. For a moment they paused, as though for
some guidance ; but the guidance was such as is
given by — 'Forward, first company!' 'Second
' company, show them the way ! ' The first who
leaped down stood unscathed in the vineyard be-
low ; the rest followed. Dangers shrink before
the advance of resolute men. There was not
much loss in that lower vineyard. The troops
pressed on.
Amongst the vineyards there were, here and
there, farm-cottages and homesteads ; and since
the obstructions which the men were encounter-
ing had destroyed their formation, it became pos-
sible for such as loved their safety more than
their honour to linger in the shelter afforded by
these buildings. Some few, they say, lingered.
The Division hurried forward with just sucli an.iovpr
trace of its original Ime-iormation as could re-
VOL. III. G
98 BATTLK OF TIIK ALMA.
CHAP, iiiain to it after rapidly passing tlirougli difficuit
, enclosures. The river, though flowing in a swift
current, was fordable by a strong man in most
places, but it was of very unequal depth. Gen-
eral Codrington was seen riding quickly across at
a point where the stream hardly flowed above his
horse's fetlocks, and yet, almost close to hiui, the
taller charger of another officer went down and
had to swim. The soldiers rapidly waded across.
Some few perished in the stream, and it was
never known whether they fell from shot or from
not being able to keep their footing in the cur-
rent.
That part of Pennefather's brigade which was
ovcrlaj^ped by the Eoyal Fusiliers '^' had become
entangled with the Light Division ; and at the
moment of Codrington's advance, Hume of the
95th seized a colour, and, dashing across the
river, carried with him the left wing of the
regiment; but the men bore so much towards
their left, that by the time they gained the foot
of the bank on the Eussian side of the river, they
had become blended, not (as might be supposed)
with the right, but with the left regiment of Cod-
rington's brigade. They were destined to share
the glory and the carnage which awaited the 23d
Fusiliers.
At length the whole Light Division, together
with the additional force under Hume which had
strayed into its company, was upon the Eussian
side of the river ; but as yet, the troops only stood
• i.e., after tlic Fusiliers had marclicd through tlie 95th.
BATTLE OV TUK ALMA. 09
upon the narrow strip of dry gruinui at tlic water's cil AT.
edge, and such of them as were in the centre, or . .
towards the right, were penned back by tlie rocky
bank which rose steep and liigh over their heads.
The soldiery were a crowd — a crowd shaped and
twisted by the winding of the river's bank, yet
with some remains of military coherence ; for
although the enclosures and the fording of the
liver could not but destroy all formation, the
men of every company had kept together as well
as they were able.
But a general who had omitted to line the bank coiirinKtmrs
, . . ■, . 1 Ti , , brigade finds
with his own skirmishers might well expect to see the top ..i
° , , . tlie left
it fringed with the enemy s rifles ; and the strong r.ank wwa
° "^ , ^ T 1 Willi Russian
wall which nature had offered to the English as a skirmishuis.
cover for the formation of their battalions was now,
of course, held by the enemy's skirmishers. These
light troops were in greatest force along the bank
which faced the centre and the right of the Light
Division. They came to the edge of the bank,
tired down into the crowd of the red-coats, and
then drew back for a pace or two that they might
load in peace and be ready to fire again. Tliey
could kill and wound men in the crowd below
without laying themselves open to fire.
Towards the left of tlie Light Division the bank course
was less abrupt, and also more free from the Gen.T.ii
enemy's skirmishers.* There, after passing the
river, General Buller, who commanded the 2d
brigade, was able to form it at his leisure. He
* Becatisc our rifles, as we saw, liad inclined to their left, and
were operating in this part of the field.
100 BATTLK or TIIH ALMA.
CHAP, ordered the 77tli riCginieiit to lie down under the
cover afforded by the configuration of the ground,
and upon a slope somewhat sheltered from the fire
of the enemy's artillery he placed the 88th Eegi-
ment.* With these two regiments he remained long
halted, not partaking in the subsequent advance
of Codrington's brigade. His reason was, that a
large body of cavalry and infantry appearing on
the plain to threaten his left,i- he thought it right
to keep two regiments in hand until he should
find himself supported by the near approach of
the Highland brigade. He conceived that ho
ought to beware of outstripping the 1st Division
by too great an interval ; and, in truth, the duty
* As to his 19lh Regiment, Si:cpost.
+ Tlie absence of Prince Mentscliikoff in a distant part of tlie
field was probal)ly the cause of the enemj-'s want of enterprise
in not pressing with any degree of vigour upon the open flank
of the English army. The only approach to any actual move-
ment against tlie flank of the Light Division at the time of its
advance from the river was one perceived and checked by Major
Norcott. Norcott, having crossed the stream, had thrown for-
ward his two right companies to a ridge in advance of the l)ank,
and witli his two remaining companies was occupying the pre-
cincts of a farmstead which offered him a point of appui for his
left flank. Whilst he was thus posted, he saw some sixty or
seventy Cossacks coming down from the south-east bj' a road
which led to the farm, and close following these he perceived
the head of a column of infantry. Norcott immediately with-
drew his two right companies from the ridge, and prepared to
make a stand at the farm. To aid him in this undertaking, he
requested Captain Colville (who had come into this part of the
field with one of Colonel Lawrence's companies) to draw U]i his
men in line across the road leading down to the farm. Seeing
these preparations for their reception, the horsemen, and the
column of infantry which liad been following them, turned about
and withdrew. — Note to ith Edition.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 101
which attached \ipon General Buller at this mo- chap.
meiit was one of a grave kind ; for if the enemy '
should seize the moment 'o^ Sir" George B"i'o\vn's uie'liSy^
assault upon the Great Eedoubt as his time for u"onL,';i
making a resolute attack wltlr horse,- -l^ob+y a>id
artillery upon the flank of our advancing troops,
the safety of the whole Allied army would be
challenged, and would be found to rest greatly
upon such dispositions as General Buller might
have made for covering our left.
Sir George Brown's order to Buller empowered
him to advance until he was over the stream ; but,
that duty having been executed, the brigadier now
found himself on the bank of a river, without, so
far as I know, having any fresh orders to guide
him, yet charged by circumstance with the duty
of covering the flank of the whole Allied army at
the moment of an assault upon the enemy's strong-
hold. The business was a vital one; and the
caution which Buller used at this time was re-
quired by the occasion.* For to push forward
the two regiments which formed the extreme left
of the whole Allied front, and to march them
against the enemy's stronghold in a line, out-
flanked by the enemy's horse, and even, it would
seem, by a portion of his foot, would have been to
lay open, not Buller's brigade merely, but tlie
whole Allied army, to the risk of a Ihmk attack
* The way in wliicli the 88tli and the 77tli rie<,ainents were
haadletl at a hiter period of tlie action was not the necessary
result of the dispositions made at this time, and is a fit subject
for distinct comments.
102 BATTLE OF Tin: Al.MA.
CHAP, iuvulving great disasters. In these circumstances
' it was Buller's duty to take up such a position as
wouJd.ei'iable 'him 'Uy cover the advance of Cod-
rington's brigade,' and lo sustain the shock of a
flank 'a'ttdck'. 'It was to that end tliat he kept in
hand the 88th aiid 7Ytli Tteoiments.
XX.
Thcigtii Tliough forming part of fjuller's brigade, tlie
19th Regiment was suffered ere long to associate
itself witli General Codrington's advance ; and
thereupon, with Lawrence's wing of the liitles
and the wing of the 95th under Hume, the force
taking part in tliis movement became swoHen
to a body of troops which, witliout sul)stantial
inaccuracy, may be counted as iive battalions.*
state (if These live battalions were extended in a broken
battalions chain at the foot of the bank on the liussian side
erowaed 01 tlic nver, and were lullnig — especially towards
irit bank cf the right — under the close lire ot the skirmishers
who crowned the top. In this strait some of our
officers instinctively tried to clear tlie front by
getting the men to mount part way up the bank,
and bring their rifles to a level with the summit.
But among the foremost the General commanding
Kir George the Dlvisioii had forded the river. Sir George
Brown was an officer whose career had begun, and
begun with glory, in the great days under Well-
Browu.
* Because comi)risiii]^ four battalions and two wings of other
battalions. The force was about to be yet furtlier augmented by
the accession of the right wing of the !)5th.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 103
ington ; but wliil.st he was still in his early man- cilAP.
hood, wars had ceased, and thenceforth, for near ;
forty years, he had bronght his strong energies to
bear upon the kind of military bnsiness which
used to be practised ))y the English in peace-time.
A long immersion in the Adjutant-General's de-
partment had led him to go even beyond other
men in laying stress upon the value of discipline ;
but the practice of this sort of industry had not
at all helped to school him for the command of
a division in war-time; for in labouring after that
mechanic perfection which, after all, is only one
of many means towards an end, the end itself had
been much forgotten by those who controlled our
military system, and the business of war (as, for
instance, the art of carrying a brigade in line
through enclosures and thick grounds) had been
little or never practised in England.* To a mili-
tary system which omits to anticipate and to deal
with the common obstacles to be expected in a
battle-field, war is a rough disturber ; and unless
the industry of the barrack-yard is supported by
other and better resources, it is liable to be turned
to nothingness by even a gentle contact with
reality. A belt of garden - ground, a Avinding
though fordable stream, and an enemy hitherto
inert, had sufficed to make Sir George Brown de-
spair of being able to present his troops to the
enemy in a state of formation. Great dislocation
* Sir Charles Napier, the conqueror of Seinde, used to press
the importance of practising trooiis iu this way, but without
success.
104 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, of military order was, of course, the necessary
^' result of having to pass through enclosures and to
ford a winding stream ; so what the main body
needed to have before it when it approached
the left bank of the river was a swarm of skir-
mishers clearing its immediate front, and prepared
to cover it during the process of forming anew.
This cover, however, was wanting. Sir George
Brown declared that to attempt any formation
after the passage of the river would be impossible,
and that he had ' determined to trust to the spirit
' and individual courage of the troops.' Thus, on
ground giving rare opportunity for the deliberate
preparation of an attack, and imder no great
stress of battle, the Light Division— the ' Light
' Division ' whose very name carried with it a
great inheritance of glory — was suffered to lapse
into a mere throng of brave men. In this plight
the five battalions had to advance under the guns
of a powerful battery supported by heavy columns
of foot.
But an officer honoured with the command of
British troops can always hope that, when his
skill fails him, his men may still retrieve the
day by sheer fighting ; and to a commander
frustrated in his evolutions, the prospect of a
rude conflict with the enemy may offer the best
kind of solace, and perhaps even a happy issue
out of trouble. Of such comfort as was to be got
from close fighting, there seemed to be fair
promise in the Great Redoubt; and there. Sir
George Brown resolved to seek it. Eager to
BATTLE OF Till': ALMA. 105
have, at the least, a forward place in the anued cuap.
throng, he suffered agony lest the Lank, very ' .
steep at the spot where he faced it, should he
inaccessible to a mounted officer ; but he soon
found a place where a break in the stiffness of the
acclivity left room for the two or three ledges
which a horseman must find before he can reach
the top. Then he quickly gained the open ground
above. The Eussian skirmishers were there.
Schooled in habits of deep reverence for military
rank, these men may have been startled, perhaps,
by the sudden apparition of the hat which bespoke
a general officer, and, what was worse, a general
officer in a state of displeasure. It seems, too,
there is something in the bearing of a fearless,
near-sighted man which disturbs the reckonings
of other people; for they see that his ways arc
not their ways, and they do not know but that
he may be right in not fearing them, and that,
if they were not to be afraid of him, they them-
selves might be in the wrong. At all events, the
enemy's skirmishers, omitting or failing to bring
down the English General, suffered him to remain
unhurt on the top of the bank. There, flushed
and angry — he was angry, perhaps, with himself,
or angry with the gardens and walls and the
perverse winding of a stream which had broken
the cherished structure of his battalions — he sat
on his grey charger full under the guns of the
Great Eedoubt, and the dun oblong columns of
the enemy's infantry that flanked it on either
Bide. However eagerly lie might be longing
106 I5ATTLH OK TIIK AT,MA.
ciiAi'. to carry forward lii.s Divisit)ii, lie was without tlie
. means of sending swift orders along his line.
But towards the right of Sir George Brown a
movement corresponding with his determination
General had already begun. General Codrington, ordered
' to advance m line and not to stop till he had
crossed the river,' had obeyed very swiftly ; but
having moved with a converging tendency during
their passage through the vineyards and the river,
the men of his brigade and the other troops acting
with them were now thickly clustered under the
left bank in a chain which took its bends from
the winding of the stream. Codrington was at
this time between the 33d Regiment and the
23d Fusiliers. He strove to do something to-
wards restoring the formation of his troops ;
but these, jammed together, in a crowd that had
been twisted into fantastic shape by the bends
of the river's bank, and besides, standing helpless
under the fire of the skirmishers shooting down
upon their heads from above, could hardly even
try to perform an evolution requiring free space
and time. And, if for a moment, it seemed pos-
sible that any approach to a formation under the
bank could be effected, the hope was rudely de-
stroyed ; for, on ground lower down the river, a
body of the enemy's light troops found for them-
selves a spot yielding them shelter, yet so placed
that it enabled them to pour a flanking tire along
the strip or ledge which divided the stream from
the bank, and this at a part where the earth
was alive with our devoted soldiery.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 107
To keep the men iinder this lire for many CHAP,
minutes, and to keep them, too, standing all tlie
time in unresisting masses, would be to lose a
brigade. The only order received by General
Codrington had been obeyed to the full. He
had no time to seek guidance from his Divisional
General Clearly there was come upon him one
of those rare conjunctures in which a career is
made to hinge upon the decision of a moment.
His father was that Admiral whose achievement
at Navarino had been a link in the chain of events
which now brought the son in arms for the Sultan's
cause. And any one who loved our navy, even to
jealousy of the land service, might persuade him-
self that the bright, ardent, straightforward glance,
and the bold, decisive speech of the Coldstream
officer, must have come by inheritance from a
sailor. He had the tightly closed lips, bespeak-
ing an obstinate man who lives a life undistracted
by breadth, and diversity of views. And much
of what he seemed he was— a firm, plain soldier,
not liable to be bent from the simple path by
refined or complex views. He could not see
far without the help of the glass which he kept
attached to his cap, but he was more alive to the
world around him than near-sighted men often
are. He had never before been in action. He
could not suffer his troops to remain for another
minute a heli)less crowd under heavy fire. He
knew not how he could withdraw them to any
ground apt for manoeuvring ; and it Mas hardly
possible for him to exert such a control over the
lOd BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CIIAP. crowd of soldiers licmiued in under the bank a3
• Avould enable him to repair the evil b}- covering
his brigade with skirmishers.
XXI.
Nelson, gliding into tlic Bay of Aboukir, told
his assembled captains that if any one of them in
the coming battle should chance to be disturbed
by doubts about what he ought to do, he might
find a good way out of trouble by closing with au
enemy's ship ; and it was a solution of this sort
that now, as it happened, won favour in the heart
of an admiral's son.
codrington With 110 autlioi'ity except that which was cast
storm the upou him by the stress of the moment, General
uedoubt. Coilrinu'ton resolved to storm the Great licdoubt;
and he resolved to do this instantly. His im-
mediate power over the disordered masses around
him was confined to the range within which he
could make himself heard ; but, lifting himself
His words a little in his stirrups, he spoke to the men in his
clear ringing voice, and ordered them (all who
could hear him) ' to fix bayonets, get up the bank,
' and advance to the attack.'
ne pains Tiieu, also, Codrington imagined that the need
tile bank, of the momcut was a ready leader rather than a
cool and placid general Besides, this was his
first battle ; and perhaps — our army, and not the
worhl, will understand him if so it was — he un-
consciously felt that the foremost place was
peculiarly befitting a Guardsman who commanded
BATTLE OF TIIK ALMA. 109
a brigade of tlic line. Willi tlio quickness of a CHAP,
man acciistonied to hunting, ho found a spot 1_
where the bank was practicable, and, facing it
obliquely, his small white Arab with two or three
strides carried him to the summit. From the
spot he thus reached the enemy's skirmishers
had withdrawn ; * and Codrington, with the few
soldiers who had already been able to gain the
top, was alone upon this part of the hill - side.
Looking up the smooth, gentle slope, he had be-
fore him the Great Eedoubt ; but for the moment
the mouths of the heavy guns which armed it
remained black and silent. On his right front
he saw a body of infantry massed in column.
The men, in their long, grey, sombre coats, stood
formed with great precision and rigidly still ; but
right and left of the mass there was a chain of
skirmishers so placed on the flanks of the column
as to be abreast of its front rank. The troops
close in rear of the body in front could hardly be
seen, for they were almost hidden by the dip of
the ground ; but the crest M'as fringed with spark-
ling light, and the light was light playing upon the
bayonet-points of battalions massed in the hollow.
Our troops were yearning to be commanded ;
and if the men, far and near, could have seen that
the horseman on the small white Arab above them
was a general officer, they would have looked to
every wave of his arm for a guiding signal ; but
* I imngiiic that tliey were witlidrawn from the spot because
it was under the guns — the guns of the Great Ecdouht— from
which the enemy was about to open fire on our troops.
110 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. Codrinnton had come out to the East with no
I •
'. higher rank than tliat of a colonel;* and his
simple forage-cap had not the significance of the
hat and the flowing plumes, which would have
shown men far from the spot that a general officer
was on the top of the bank. There were soldiers,
however, who gained tlie top almost at the same
moment as their leader. First one here and there,
then knots, then bevies of men clambered up.
Hitherto, the knowledge that there was to be
an advance beyond the bank had been confined
to tlie people who chanced to be near Sir George
Brown or General Codrington ; but those who
heard tlie words or caught the meaning of the
divisional general and the brigadier, hastened to
give effect to the will of their chiefs by sending
their words along the line.
The Eoyal Fusiliers, being on the extreme right
of Codrington's brigade, was beyond the reach
LaryYca of his personal guidance, but Lacy Yea,+ who
and his t i
FusiiiLTs. commanded the regiment, w^as a man of an on-
ward, fiery, violent nature, not likely to suffer
his cherished regiment to stand helpless under
muzzles pointed down on him and his people by
the skirmishers close overhead. The will of a
horseman to move forward, no less than his power
* He had come out in command of the 1st battalion of the
Coldstream ; but the Brevet of the 20th of June deprived him
of his command by making liim a Major-General. He, however,
remained in the East as a traveller, and was appointed on the
1st of September to the command of tbe 1st Brigade of the
Light Division.
t Pronounced Yaw.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. Ill
to elude or overcome all obstacles, is singulnrly cjiap.
strengthened by tlie education of the hunting- '.
field, and Lacy Yea had been used in early days
to ride to hounds in one of the stiffest of all hunt-
ing-counties. To him this left bank of the Alma
crowned with Eussian troops was very like the
wayside acclivity which often enough in his boy-
hood had threatened to wall him back and keep
him down in the depths of a Somersetshire lane
whilst tlie hounds were running high up in the
field some ten or fifteen feet above. His practised
eye soon showed him a fit ' shord ' or break in the
scarped face of the bank, and then, shouting out
to his people, ' Never mind forming ! Come on,
men ! Come on, anyhow ! ' he put his cob to the
task, and quickly gained the top.
On either side of him, men of his regiment
rapidly climbed up, and in such numbers that the
Russian skirmishers who had been lining it fell
back upon their battalions.
And now, in tlie masses still crowded along the tho iicann-
foot of the bank, there rose up that murmur of I'oneaurt'hc'
prayer for closer fighting which, coming of a sud- '"'"''■
den from men of Teuton blood, is the advent of a
new and seemingly extrinsic power — the power
ascribed in old times to the hand of an Immortal.
From the first company of the Royal Fusiliers to
the left of the 19th Regiment, tlie deep, angry,
gathering sound was 'Forward!' 'Forward!'
' Forward ! ' The throng was heaved ; and pre-
sently the whole 1st brigade of the Light Division,
with the other troops th.at had joined it, sui'ged
112
BATTLE OF TIIK ALMA.
C IT A P.
I.
KfTect of the
converging
tendency
which liad
trovemed
tilt troops.
lip, and in nnmbcrlcss waves began to break over
the bank.
When once on the top of tlio bank, the ' five
battalions ' there gatliered had no physical ob-
struction before them, but were grievously want-
ing in elbow-room ; for that tendency to converge,
of which we have spoken already, had contracted
the front they presented to what was only a frac-
tion of the line they would have formed with
their ranks deployed in due order ; and the opera-
tion of taking ground and opening out into line was
not one that could well be performed by a crowd
of soldiery gathered under the guns of the Great
Itodoubt, and besides in the presence — close
presence — of powerful liussian columns. It is
true that the Eoyal Fusiliers, being on the ex-
treme right of the brigade, and not finding them-
selves cramped at that time by any pressure from
the troops of the 2d Division, had room to de-
ploy ; and, though numbers of soldiers belonging
to other corps were mixed up with his regiment,
Lacy Yea, using violent energy, was able in some
degree to make the men open out. Colonel
Endeavours LUike, too, of tlic 33d v/as so circumstanced as to
to form line 1)0 able after a while to make his regiment open
oftiicbank. out, and in all the regiments our soldiers strove
hard to put themselves in their English array ;
but to almost all of them space was wanting ;
and the silence which is the pride of the Eng-
lish army could not at that moment be pre-
served, fur numbers of men, separated from their
companies and their regiments, yet eager to follow
IJATTLK OF TilH ALMA. 113
the path ol' duty, were anxiously seeking advice ciiAi'.
from oHicers, and trying, in fact, to place them- '
selves under such command as time and circum-
stance would allow. In this condition of things
the utmost that could be done in most cases was
to try to give to the mass the rudiments of a line-
ibrmation ; and upon the whole it may be said
that although tliese five battalions, having now
open ground before them, were no longer a
helpless mass, their state was not such as v/ould
enable a chief to manoeuvre them by simple word
of command. They were an armed and M'arlike
crowd.
The five battalions thus gathered on the crest of Tiictask
the bank were the first body of Allied troops which before 'them
moved up to dispute with the enemy for ground
he was holding in strength. Both their right and
their extreme left confronted Russian infantry
columns, drawn up near each flank of the Great
Redoubt ; but the centre and left centre of this
part of our assailing force stood right under the
face of the work, and directly meeting its frown.
Although far from having been able to open
out as was wished, the knotted chain of the red-
coats had still a much greater front than the par-
apet of the opposing redoubt ; and accordingly
those troops which constituted the flanks of our
assaulting force had no mission to throw them-
selves forward (as the centre was going to do)
against the mouths of great guns ; but on the
other hand, they needs must encounter the gathered
masses of infantry drawn up abreast of the work.
VOL. in. 11
114
IIATTLK Ol' THE AL.MA.
C H A I'.
I.
Aclvanrc of
tlie Riglit-
liand Kazan
culumii.
Two ol" these from their two respective positions
on the flanks of the Iiedoubt now be^an to move
down the hillside.
The one descending from the eastern flank of
tlie work,* marched against that part of our line
which was formed by Lawrence's Piifles,-f" by tlie
19th Regiment, and by the 23d or Eoyal Welsh
Fusiliers. Already, this right-hand Kazan column
had advanced some way down the slope before any
great number of the Englisli had clambered u\) to
the top of the bank ; and our soldiers, it woidd
seem, at that time might have been forced back
into the channel of the river by a continued and
resolute advance of the descending force ; but
when, one by one, and in knots and groups, our
men gained the top of the bank, Avhen they saw
the ground above spreading smooth and open
before them, and the huge grey square-built mass
gliding down to where they were, then, happily
for England and for the freedom of Europe — for
on this in no small measure the common weal
seems to rest — it came to be seen that now, after
near forty years of peace, our soldiery were still
* A doublu-battalion column, I believp, of the Kazan Kegi-
nient. This Kazan corps, of which we shall see a great deal,
is more commonly called in Russian accounts the 'Grand Duke
' Michael's Regiment.' It was a regiment of 'chasseurs.'
+ Major Norcott's two right companies had been extended
along the ridge above the river's bank, and were lying down,
when Colonel Lawrence advancing in person with his wing of
the Rille battalion, an intermixture took ]>lace ; and accord-
ingly it must be understood that, both here and in subsequent
pages, my mention of 'Lawrence's Rifles' includes some of the
men belonging to Major Norcott's wing.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 115
gifted with the priceless quality ^vhich hinders CIIAP.
them from feeling, in the way that foreigners feel '
it, the weight of a column of infantry. In their
English way, half sportive, half surly, our young
soldiers seemed to measure their task ; and then —
many of them still holding betwixt their teeth the
tempting clusters of grapes they had gathered in
the vineyards below — they began shooting easy
shots into the big, solid mass of infantry which
was solemnly marching against them. The column
besides at this time was moving under a fire
directed against its right flank by some of Norcott's
Eiilemen (then ensconced some way off in a farm- The column
Ti -1 1-Tii.''* defeated,
stead) and yet, as seen by our people, it did not and re-
appear unsteady. It was perhaps an over-drilled
body of men unskilfully or weakly handled. At
all events, the mass failed to make its weight and
strength tell against clusters of English lads who
stood facing it merrily, and teasing it with rifle-
balls. The column before long was ordered or
suffered to yield ; and, because falling back in a
hollo-w, it lapsed nearly or quite out of sight.
Then, having thus ridded themselves of the in-
fantry force in their front. Colonel Lawrence's Rifle-
men, and the 19th I'egiment, and the Eoyal Welsh
begaij, as they advanced, to bend towards their
right, and thenceforth became a part of the force
we shall presently see engaged in the storming of
the Great Eedoubt.
The other Kazan column -^^ ^the column coming TheLeu
Kazan
down from the west flank of the redoubt— was a column.
*A double-battalion column, I believe, containing 1500 men.
116
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
c II A r.
I.
force of lii<i;h mettle ; and it soon began that
obstinate figlit of which we shall by-and-by hear
— a fight destined with the Royal Fusiliers, des-
tined to last from the commencement of the in-
fantry engagement until almost the close of the
battle.
The storm-
ing of the
Great
Uedoubt.
XXII.
AVith that part — the central part — of the ' five
' l)attalions' which had not been challenged by
infantry, General Codrington was already moving
up under the guns of the Great Eedoubt. He,
indeed, had not waited for the moment when
his whole brigade reached the top of the bank ;
for, having gathered some knots of men on either
side of him, he rode forward gently a few paces,
then waited until he gained some increase of
numbers, and then again moved on, thus canvas-
sing, as it were, for followers, and gradually car-
rying forward with him more and more of the
troops. At first, he got on slowly ; for the bulk
of our officers having had no order to dispense
with formation, tliey judged, when they gained
the top of the bank, that they ought to strive to
form line bel'ore they advanced, and they were
labouring to that end ; but when it came to be
understood that an advance without formation
was sanctioned by the generals or compelled by
stress of events, the whole of the force, though
clul)bed and broken into clusters of men, began
to move up the gentle slope of the hill.
I'.ATTLE OF Tin: ALMA. 1 1 7
For a little while every gun in the great battery c ii A P.
above remained dark and silent. 1^
Amongst the Eussians who were plying their
field-glasses from the parapet of the Great Ee-
doubt there was a question meet for debate : —
' If the scarlet men of the sea were presumptu-
* ously bent upon storming the work, where was
' the great column of attack, and where the great
' column of support, and where the great columns
* of reserve that must needs have been formed for
' such an enterprise ? Yet, if they had no such
' purpose, wdiy were so many men coming up
' under the guns within grape-shot range ? And
* unless those English were really attacking in
' force, why, in the name of the Holy Virgin and
' our own blessed Sergins,* why, riding forward
' even in front of the skirmishers, should there
' be that superb-looking horseman on the grey
' charger,' — they meant, of course, Sir George
Brown — ' whose visible rage no less than his
* general's hat clearly showed that he held high
* command ? '
Upon the whole, it seemed that the advance of
the red-coated soldiery must be an irruption of
skirmishers preparatory to an attack in force, but
still an irruption so strong as to be worthy of all
that artillery could do to crush it. So, the Pais-
sian sharpshooters having now for the most part
* The troops in and near tlie redoubt belon^t^ed to the 16th
Division — a body which carried with it the ' Icon,' or pictured
image of St Sergius. This venerated image had been solemnly
entrusted to the Division bj' the Bishop of Moscow.
118 P,ATTLK OF THK AI.MA.
cii A P. I'alleii back, or moved aside out of the line of fire,
L__ the gunners in the Great Redoubt made ready to
open fire upon our regiments with round-shot,
canister, and grape.
First one gun, then another, then more. From
east to west the parapet grew white, and because
of the bank of new smoke, no gun could any
longer be seen by our men, except at the moment
when it was pouring its blaze through the cloud ;
but on what one may call a glacis, at three hun-
dred yards from the mouths of the guns, the
lightning, the thunder, and the bolt are not far
apart. It was at an early moment after emerg-
ing from the bed of the stream that the slaughter
of our people began. Indeed some of them, when
struck down, had so nearly reached the top of the
bank that they fell back dead and dying into
the channel of the river. Death loves a crowd,
and many fell ; but all who were not struck down
continued to move forward. In some places, the
closer portions of tlic advancing throng were eight
or ten deep ; and the round-shot, tearing cruelly
through and through, mowed down so many of
our devoted soldiery tliat several times by sheer
havoc the clusters lor a moment were thinned.
But only for a moment; because that singular
tendency which had begun with the advance into
the vineyards w-as now setting in more strongly.
Moving to the attack without being ordered to
make towards any given spot, almost every officer
and man (except those towards the flanks who
were engaged with the enemy's infantry) had in-
BATTLE OF THE AI.MA. 119
stiuctively proposed to liiniself tlie same goal; chap.
and this goal was the Great Eedoubt. Upon the ^'
Great Eedoubt, therefore, the regiments kept
always converging ; and in less time than it took
the Paissian artillerymen to sponge and load their
guns, our people, inclining away from the flanks,
and pressing in towards the centre, fdled up every
space cut clear by the shot ; and this so constantly
that, again, after a fall of many men, and again,
and still again, there was always a crowd meet
for slaughter.
Amongst the troops thus converging upon the
centre there was the right wing of tlie Derbyshire,
the 95th Ilegiment, its foremost company led with
unflinching boldness and zeal by Captain Sargent.*
* Before the crossing of the river, this wing of the 95th had
become separated from the other one, and stood halted by a
vineyard under a pelting storm of mitrail. For some time.
General Pennefather was with this right wing, and by the side
of Captain Sargent's company, whieli was not then aligning
with the other three, but drawn up in front of them. Penne-
father was so close to Captain Sargent tliat he could not have
given any order without Sargent's knowing it ; and, when the
General rode off (as he presently did towards his right), Sargent
was able to inform his commanding ofTicei-, Major Champion,
that no recent order for the guidance of the wing had been
given by the Brigadier. Although of a negative kind, tliis in-
formation was at the moment of great importance to Champion ;
and, the troops being all this while under a severe fire, he
quickly came to his resolve. In answer to a remark from Sar-
gent, he said to him at once : ' Then lead on with your com-
• pany ! ' Thereupon Sargent led forward his company, which
was followed by the other ihree, all four of course under the
orders of Champion ; and the way in which the onset was con-
ducted is suflicientl}' shown in the text. These were the cir-
cumstances under which Champion .stated in his official report
that the riglit wing was led with ' determined bravery ' by Cap-
120 liATTLK OF THE AI-MA.
CHAP. The Colonel was wounded, and Major Cliani])ion
L_ succeeded to the command of tlic regiment ; but
with this its right wing as before he continued to
be present in person. Shot dealt havoc around him.
Captain Eddington was shot in the throat and
killed ; Polhill was torn and slain with grape.
Champion was a man of great gentleness and
piety; and if he was not highly endowed with
intellectual gifts, he was able to express the feel-
ings of his heart with something of a poetic force.
His mind was accustomed to dwell very much on
the world that lies beyond the grave ; and in the
midst of this scene of carnage he gained, as it were,
a seeming glimpse of the happy state ; for when
the younger Eddington fell at liis side, Champion
paused to sec what ailed him, and looking upon
his young friend's pale face, lie saw it suddenly
clotlied with a ' most sweet expression.' It was
because death was on him that the blissful look
had come. In the mind of Champion the sight
had a deep import ; for he was of the faith that
God's Providence is special, and to him the
beautiful smile on the features of * the dead ' was
the smile of an immortal man gently carried away
from earth by the very hand of his Maker.
Yet this piety of his was of no un warlike cast.
Nay, he was of so noble a sort that, though he
had not willingly cliosen the profession of arms,
yet, when he prayed, Ik; was accustomed to render
tain Sargent. Sargent was wounded, but lie refused to go on
board ship, clung fast to the campaign, and lived to bring hit
refiment out of action on the great day of Inkeranin.
BATTLK OF THE ALMA. 121
thanks to his Creator for vouclisafing to make chap.
him a liardy soldier ; and being, he said, very ^
strong in the belief that he could die as piously on
the battle-field as in ' a downy bed,' he pressed on,
content with his 'Derbies,' to the face of the
Great Redoubt.
And now, whilst the assailing force was rent
from front to rear with grape and canister poured
down from the heavy guns above, another and a
not less deadly arm was brought to bear against
it ; for the enemy marched a body of infantry into
the rear of the breastwork ; and his helmeted
soldiers, kneeling behind the parapet at the inter-
vals between the embrasures, watched, ready with
their muskets on the earthwork, till they thought
our people were near enough, and then hred into
the crowd. Moreover, the troops on either flank
of the redoubt began to fire obliquely into the
assailing mass.
Then, for such of our men as were new to war,
it became time to learn that the ear is a false
guide in the computation of passing shot ; and
that amid notes sounding like a very torrent of
balls, the greater part of even a crowded force may
remain unhurt. The storm of rifle and musket
balls, of grape and canister, came in blasts ; and
although there were pauses, yet whilst a blast was
sweeping through, it seemed to any young soldier,
guided by the sound of the rushing missiles, that
nowhere betwixt them, however closely he might
draw in his limbs, could there be room for him to
stand unscathed. But no man shrank. Our sol-
122 BATTLE OF THK ALMA.
CEIAP. diers, still pantiim witli tlie vi(jleuce of their
' labour in crossing the river and scaling the bank,
scarcely fired a shot, and they did not speak ; but
they, every one, Avent forward. The trutli is, that
the weak-hearted men had been left beliind in the
gardens and buildings of the village; the dross
was below, and the force on the hill-side was pure
metal. Our men were so intent on their purpose,
that not one of them, it is said, at tliis time, was
seen to cast back a look towards the ground
whence support might be coming.
The assailants were nearing the breastwork,
when, after a lull of a few moments, its ordnance
all thundered at once, or at least so nearly at the
same moment that the pathway of their blast
was a broad one ; and there were many who fell ;
but the onset of our soldiery was becoming a
rush. Codrington, riding in front of the men,
gaily cheered them on ; and all who were not
struck down by shot pi'essed on towards the
long bank of smoke which lay dimly enfolding
the redoubt.
But already — though none of the soldiery en-
gaged then knew who wrought the spell — a hard
stress had been put upon the enemy. For a while,
indeed, the white bank of smoke, lit tlirough here
and there with the slender flashes of musketry,
stood fast in the front of the parapet, and still all
but shrouded the helmets and the glittering bay-
onets within ; but it grew more thin : it began to
rise ; and, rising, it disclosed a grave change in
the counsels of the Eussian Generals. Some
BATTLE OF TllK ALMA. 123
Englishman — or many, perhaps, at the same cilAP.
moment — looking keen through the smoke, saw '
teams of artillery-horses moving, and there was a
sound of ordnance- wheels. Our panting soldiery
broke from tlieir silence. ' By all that is lioly !
* he is limbering up!' 'He is carrying off his guns!'
' Stole away ! Stole away ! Stole away I ' The
glacis of the Great Eedoubt had come to sound
more joyous than the covert's side in England.
The embrasures were empty, and in rear of the
work, long artillery-teams — eight-horse and ten-
horse teams — were rapidly dragging off the guns.
Then a small child-like youth ran forward be-
fore the throng, carrying a colour. This was
young Anstruther. He carried the Queen's col-
our of the Royal Welsh. Eresh from the games
of English school-life, he ran fast ; for, heading
all who strove to keep up with him, he gained
the redoubt, and dug the butt-end of the flag-
staff into the parapet ; and there for a moment
he stood, holding it tight, and taking breath.
Then he was shot dead ; but his small hands,
still clasping the flagstaff, drew it down along
with him, and the crimson silk lay covering the
boy with its folds. His successor in charge of
the colour, namely, centre sergeant Luke O'Con-
nor, was brought down at nearly that moment
by a shot which struck his breast ; but William
Evans, a swift -footed soldier, ran forward, and
had caught up the fallen standard, when O'Con-
nor (finding strength enough to be able to rise)
made haste to assert his right, and then proudly
124 ]!ATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CllAi'. ui)lK)l(ling tlic C(j]our, he laid claim to llio Great
" liedoubt oil behalf of the 'lioyal Welsh.'* The
colour lloating high in the air, and seen by our
])eople far and near, kindled in them a raging
love for the ground where it stood. Breathless
men found speech. General Codrington, still in
the front, uncovered, saluting the crisis, waved
his cap for a sign to his people, and then, riding
straight at one of the embrasures, leapt his grey
Arab into the breastwork. There were some
eager and swift -footed soldiers who sprang the
parapet nearly at the same moment ; more fol-
lowed. Fire opening then on our people from a
battery higher up the hill-side, both Lawrence
and his adjutant Ross were unhorsed by a blast
of grape - shot ; but the ground that received
* It commonly liappens that inoidents occurring in a battle
are told by the most truthful bystanders with dilferenccs more
or less wide. All agree that J'oung Anstruther ruslieil forward
just as is mentioned in the text, and that being shot dead, he
fell clasping the colour in the way above described ; but, an-
cording to the testimony of some, the spot of ground where he
fell was several paces below the redoubt. After the capture of
the redoubt, sergeant Luke O'Connor, notwithstanding his
wound, persisted in refusing to part with the honour of carry-
ing the colour. Lieutenant Granville, and also, I think, some
other ofTicers of the regiment, observed that O'Connor was grow-
ing weak from the effect of his wound, and pressed him to go
to the rear ; but setting at nought all these counsels, O'Connor
persisted in his determination to carry the cherished standard
until the close of the battle. He received the thanks of Sir
. George Brown and General Codrington on the field ; and, for
having done what is above told, he was decorated with the
Victoria Cross. lie was also promoted. lie is now (this was
I written in 18G3) a captain iu that same devoted regiment with
which he liad the glory of serving on the day of the Alma.
BATTLE or TlIK AL.MA. 125
Liiwrciico falling was indeed the very g(xd he cii A i
had sought, for he rolled at the foot of the L_
breastwork. At each flank of the work, no less
than along its whole front, agile men were now
fast bounding in.
The enemy's still lingering skirmishers began
to fall back, and descended — some of them slowly
— into the dip where their battalions were massed.
The bullc of our soldiery were up, and they flooded
in over the parapet, hurrahing, jumping over, hur-
rahing— a joyful English crowd.
The cheer had not yet died away on the hill-
side, when from the enemy's battalions standing
massed in the hollow there rose up, as thuugli it
had been wrung from the very hearts of brave
men defeated, a long, sorrowful, wailing sound.
This was the bitter and wholesome grief of a
valiant soldiery not content to yield. For men
who so grieve there is hope. The redoubt had
been seized by our people ; it was not yet lost to
the Czar.
At the sight of the brass howitzer which was
found in the work, a characteristic desire to assert
the claims of private or corporate ownership be-
gan to seize upon the crowd ; and more than one
man — so they say — scratched his mark upon the
piece, that he might make it the peculiar trophy
of himself or his regiment. But there was a bet-
ter prize than this within the reach of a nimble
soldier ; for of the guns moving off towards the
rear tlierc was one which, dragged by only three
horses, had scarcely yet gained the rear of tlie
126 BATThK OF Tin; ALMA.
CHAP, redoubt. Captain Bell, of the Eoyal Welsh, ran
! up, overtook it, and, pointing his capless pistol
at the head of the driver, ordered him, or rather
signed to hira, to stop instantly and dismount.
The driver sprang from his saddle and fled. Bell
seized the bridle of the near horse, and he had
already turned the gun round, when, Sir George
Brown riding up angry, and ordering him to go
to his company, he of course obeyed, yet not
until he had effectually started the horses in the
right direction ; for they drew the gun down the
hill, and the capture became complete.*
Of the men who had moved forward from the
top of the river's bank, many now lay upon the
hill-side dead or wounded ; and the Eoyal Fusi-
liers, with fragments of other regiments, were still
engaged with the enemy's infantry ; but the
greater portion of five battalions were now upon
the ground which the enemy had made his
stronghold.+
Yet the tendency to converge towards the re-
doubt as their goal had so closely compressed the
assailing mass, that its front now hardly outflanked
the parapet ; and all the assailants of the redoubt
were either within the work or closely gathered
round it.
These men by their impetuous onset had appa-
rently bewildered the enemy ; for though having on
* The gun is now at Woolwich. The lior.ses served for some
time in our ' IHack Battery.'
+ Tlie 33.1, the ' Royal Welsh ' (or 23d), the ' Derbies ' (95tli),
the 19th, and tlie 2d "battalion of the Rifle Brigade.
BATTLH OF THE ALMA. 127
this one liill-side sixteen unbroken battalions of chap.
infantry supported by a powerful artillery as well '.
as by the cavalry arm, he nevertheless for the
moment hung back, as though minded to acqui-
esce in his loss. Our soldiery, on the other hand,
were well inclined to rest and make themselves at
home ; and General Codrington, alighting from his
horse, began to sliow the men how best to estab-
lish themselves on the ground they had won by
lying down outside the parapet, and resting their
rifles upon its top.
Thus the assaulting force had carried the great
field-work which guarded the key of the enemy's
position on the Alma ; and if at this time the
supporting Division had been half-way up the
hill, or even if it had been beginning to crown the
banks of the river on the Eussian side, the toils
and perils of the day would perhaps have been
over. But our men were only a crowd ; and
they, all of them, wise and simple, now began to
learn in the great school of action that the most
brilliant achievement by a disordered mass of
soldiery requires the speedy support of formed
troops.
Then — and then, as is said, for tlie first time —
tlie men cast back a look towards the quarter from
which they might hope to see supports advancing ; no sun-orts
but when they carried their eyes down the slopes up from'tiTe
strewn thick with the wounded and the dead, they rivers kiuk.
saw that, from the ground where they stood down
home to tlie top of the river's bank, there were no
succours cominii.
128 BATTLE 01-' THE ALMA.
XXIII.
CH A r. WhoiG were the supports i
' The right of the 1st Division was lorined Ity
riicGu,ird3. the brigade of 'Guards.' In its origin, the appel-
lation given to the regiments called 'the Guards'
imported that the personal safety of the sovereign
was peculiarly connnitted to their charge. Princes
have imagined that, by specially ascribing this
duty to a particular portion of their armed forces
rather than to the whole, and by granting some
privileges to troops specially distinguished as their
chosen defenders, they secure to themselves good
means of safety in time of trouble ; and that still,
upon the whole, they do more good tlian harm to
their military .system, by establishing a healthy
spirit of rivalry between the favoured body and
the rest of the army. The danger i.s, that a corps
thus set apart will come to be considered as a
great reserve of military strength, an<l that, tor
that very reason, any disaster which it may sus-
tain will be looked upon as more ruinous than a
disaster of equal proportions occurring to other
regiments.
With us, the corps of Guards numbers only
seven battalions, distributed into three regiments,
called the Grenadier Guards, the Coldstream, and
the Scots Fusilier Guards; and each of these
three regiments had sent one battalion to Ibrm
the brigade of Guards now serving in tlio 1st
Division. The oHicers of the corps enjoy some
privileges tending to accelerate their advancement
T5ATTLE OF THE ALMA. 129
in the army. They are, for the most part, men chap.
well born or well connected ; and being aided by ^'
a singularly able body of sergeants and corporals,
they are not so over-burtheued in peace-time by
their regimental duties as to have their minds in
the condition which too often results from mono-
tonous labour. They have deeply at heart the
honour of the whole body of the Guards as well
as of their respective regiments ; and the feeling
is quickened by a sense of the jealousy which
their privileges breed, or rather, perhaps, by the
tradition of that ancient rivalry which exists be-
tween the ' Guards ' and the ' Line.'
The Guardsmen of the rank and file have some
advantages over the line in the way of allowances
and accoutrements. They are all of fine stature.
Without being overdrilled, they are well enough
practised in their duties ; and whoever loves war
sees grandeur in the movement of the stately
forms and the towering bearskins which mark a
battalion of the Guards. It is true that these
household troops are cut off from the experience
gained by line regiments in India and the colon-
ies ; but whenever England is at war in Europe,
or against people of European descent, it is the
custom and the pride of the Guards to take their
part.
The officers of the Guards have so many rela-
tives and friends amongst those who generate con-
versation in London, that when two or three of
their battalions are sent upon active service, the
war in which they engage becomes, as it were for
VOL. III. I
130 BATTLE OF THE AI.MA.
CHAP, their sake, a subject of interest in circles whicli
• commonly yield only a languid attention to events
beyond the seas. Grief for the death of line ofii-
cers is dispersed among the counties of the three
kingdoms ; and when they fall in battle, it is the
once merry country-house, the vicarage, or the
wayside cottage of some old Peninsular olhccr,
that becomes the house of mourning. But by the
loss of olTicers of the household regiments the
central body of l^iglish society is to\iched, is
shocked, is almost angered ; and a connnander
who has to sit in his saddle and see a heavy
slaughter of the Guards, may be almost forced to
think ruefully of fathers, of mothers, of wives, of
sisters, who are amongst his own friends.
There was nothing in the history or traditions
of the famous corps of the Guards to justify the
notion that they were to be more often kept out
of the brunt of the battle than the troops of the
line ; and in this very ^var they were destined to
encounter the hardest trials of soldiers, and to go
on iigliting and enduring until the glory of past
achievements, the strange ascendancy wliich those
achievements had won, and a few score of wan
men with hardly the garb of soldiers, .should l)e
all that remained of 'the Guards.' Still it is
certain that the household Ixittalions were more
or less regarded as a cherished body of troops, and
that the loss of the brigade of Guards would be
looked upon as a loss more signal, and in that
sense more disastrous, than the loss of three other
battalions of equal strength.
BATTLE OF TlIK ALMA. 1 •') I
The Duke of Cambridge is the gnuidson ot" chat.
King George III., and a cousin of the Queen. '
At the outbreak of tlic war lie was tliirty-five SimbS'
years of age. He had made the most of such
experience as could be gained by following the
vocation of a military life in the Bi'itish Isles.
He understood the mechanism of our army system;
and so far as could be judged by the test of home
service, he was a good and a diligent soldier.
Nay, he had some qualifications for command
Avhich are not very common in England. He
loved order, method, and organisation. Long
before the war it had been said that he was
gifted with that faculty of moving troops which
is one of the prime qualifications of a general
officer ; and the skill with which his su[)erb
Division had been now deployed, seemed to give
safe ground for saying that the flattering rumour
was true. He was zealous and devoted to duty.
He had the hal)it of exercising forethought. He
was sagacious, and was more keenly alive than
most other men of our land -service to passing
and coming events. He had a good military
eye.*
* A few words wliich fell from Lord Raglan in Octolier
1854 have, caused me, perhaps, to speak with more confulenoo
on this subject than I might otherwise venture to show. In
that month — I believe on the loth — Lord Eaglau spoke to
me of the exceeding anxiety of the Duke of Cambridge about
the Inkerman position, and he said that in consequence of
this pressure measures had been taken. Exactly three weeks
afterwards the very ground about wliich the Duke had been so
anxious was the scene of the mighty onslaught which com-
menced the battle of Inkerman.
132 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. Kg was a great respecter of llic })ul)lic voice
. in England, and \vas even, perhaps, loo ready
to suffer liimself to be swayed by light, transient
breezes of 'opinioTi.' lie had no dread of in-
novations ; and the beard that clothed his frank,
liandsome, manly face, was the symbol of his
adhesion to a then new revolt against custom.
He was much loved, for he was of a genial
temper; and his rank was so w-ell helped out
by his hereditary faculty of remembering those
with whom he had once conversed, that, far from
chilling his intercourse with other men, it enabled
liim to give happy effect to the kindliness of his
nature. I'ut, after all, what a general has to
do is to try to overcome the enemy by exposing
his own soldiery to all needful risks. At any
fit time he must be willing and eager to bring
his own people to the slaughter for tlie sake of
making havoc with the enemy ; and it is right
for him to be able to do this withont at the time
being seen to feel one pang. Nay, however cer-
tain it may be that his gentler nature will over-
come him on the nK)rrow, it is well ibr him to be
able to pass through the bloodiest hours of battle
with something of a ruthless joy. The Duke of
Cambridge was wanting in this kind of trucu-
lence ; and, however careless of his own life
(for he had the personal courage of his race), he
was liable to be cruelly wrung by the weight of
a command which charged him with the lives
of other men. lie was of an anxious tempera-
ment; and with him the danger was that, in
BATTLE OF TIIM ALMA. 133
riioinents when m-eat stress ini^lit come to bo CHAP.
• • I
put upon him, the very keenness of his desire to ' .
judge ariglit would become a cruel hindrance.
Nor was he a man who would be driven to
burst his way througli scruples and doubts by
the impulse of any selfish ambition. Far from
straining after occasions for acting on his own
judgment, he would have liked, if he could, to
receive a series of precise orders which would
serve to guide him in every successive change.
But a general of division must not expect to be
long in a campaign without being thrown upon
his own judgment. Lord Raglan had furnished
the Duke with one order — an order ' to support
* the Light Division in its forward movement ' —
and the Duke of Cambridge had begun to obey it
by following the advance of the Light Division,
and bringiu'ij his force home down to the en-
closures ; but having thus come to the end of
the open ground, he felt the want of some new
sanction before he carried his Division into the
vineyards. He knew that, for a while at least,
the superb array of his Guards and Highlanders
would be shattered by passing through enclosures,
and he wished for another order from Head-
quarters before he submitted to see his beautiful
line broken up. The order ' to support the Light
' Division' was becoming an imperfect guide, be-
cause that same Light Division had rushed head-
long upon a task which was dissolving great
part of it into a vast swarm of skirmishers.
Were the Guards and Highlanders to do the
13-4 IIATTI.K 01" Tin: ALMA.
CHAP, like? Wrre they to do thus, alUioiiL;h tlieir
efficacy us a force acting iu support of the troops
in advance was likely to depend upon their being
Hriitof tiie able to come up in good order ? The 1st Division
i«fn?r.'n-''' was halted ; yet the Light Division was moving
v'iiicyunis. rapidly forward.
Wliy was there this failure of concert between
the Light and the 1st Divisions ? Why was theve
no man there who could link the one Division to
the other by a few decisive words ?
Lord Ifaglan hatl already given his orders, and
at this moment, led forward by a golden chance,
he was riding far away in another part of the
field. Sir George ih'own, already in the enclo-
sures, and having no line of skirmishers to cover
the advance of his battalions, was unable to
govern the movements of his Division in such
a way as to prevent it from gvtting too i'ar iu
advance of the Guards and Highlanders; and
afterward.?, when Sir George went forward in
person \vith that part of his ])ivision which
stormed the redoubt, he seems to have found no
means of communicating with the Duke of Cam-
bridge and pressing for the immediate su})port of
the 1st Division.
Every moment was precious ; for the men of
the Light Division were moving down at a run
through the vineyards, or wading across the
river.
At the time of this halt the battalion of the
Grenadier Guards was across the great road.
Thither now, from the west, a hor.seman came
liATTI.r. OF Tin: alma. liiT)
galloping up. Of au actual (irder General Airey ciiAT.
wsiS not the bearer; but he was a man whose '. — .
loyalty towards his chief made him always feel a™'
certain that what he himself saw clearly to be <^°'"" up-
right was exactly what his chief desired to have
done ; and the result was, that in an emergency
he was able to speak with a weight wliich virtu-
ally brought to bear upon the matter in hand the
whole power of Headquarters. His keen eye had
detected the halt of the 1st Division, and he saw
also that the Light Division was pushing forward
at a run. Another man would have gone round
or sent to the commander of the forces for his
opinion ; but every moment of the lapsing time
was bringing danger.
General Airey rode straight up to General Ben- ui.s exposi-
^ - .^ , , tion of tin;
tinck* and explained it to be Lord Kaglans order to
^ 1 1 T • 1 advance in
meaning that the 1st Division should instantly suniort.
continue its advance in support of the Light
Division. 'Must we,' asked Bentinck — 'must
' we always keep within three hundred yards of
' the Light Division ?' ' No,' said Airey, ' not ne-
' cessariiy at any fixed distance ; that would not
' be possible. AVhat His Ptoyal Highness has to
' do is to support the Light Division by advanc-
' ing in conformity with its movements.' At this
moment the Duke of Cambridge rode up, and to
him Airey repeated it to be Lord Eaglan's mean-
* Lord Raglan liad made an order .specially providing that
the bearer of an order for a divisional general should deliver it
to the first brigadier whom he haj)pened to find, to be hy him
transmitted to the divisional chief.
13G 13ATTLK OF THE ALMA.
ciiA P. ing that the Division should instantly ' push on.'
_ '._ H.R.H. then gave orders for the immediate ad-
vance of the Division, and Clifton, I think, Nvas tlie
aide-de-camp who carried the order to Sir Colin
Campbell. Then the 1st Division moved forward.
Now the enemy, Avhilst he dealt with the
tumultuous onset of Codrington's brigade, had
rightly enough given some of his care to the
more ceremonious advance of the 1st Division ;
and since the Guards confronted both the Cause-
way batteries and the Great Eedoubt, they of
course underwent for a time a fire of artillery, and
some men were struck down.* The Grenadiers
and the Scots Fusiliers suffered the most. This
loss did not occur as a consequence of any mis-
take : it was in the order of things that it should
be. But when men are new to war, and so placed
in the battle-field as to be for the moment cut off
from all knowledge of what is going on elsewhere,
they are prone to imagine that a force which they
see undergoing slaughter, yet having no immediate
means of attack or resistance, must needs be the
victim of some piece of forgetfulness or error ;
and when once this notion has got its lodgment
in the brain of an officer, his next step probably
is to try to avert what he fancies to be an im-
pending disaster by venturing to disobey oi'ders,
or by counselling anotlier to do so.
* Kvi'u wlien the Great Kedoubt had been dismantled, and
the Causeway batteries withdrawn, there were some guns in
battery at more remote spots, which seem to have been brought
to bear on tliu Guards.
BATTLE OF TIIL; ALMA. 137
Afterwards — but not, it seems, by any forma] CHAP,
order to halt — the advance of the 1st Division '
was again stopped for a time; yet Codrington's ^oua'aiii
brigade had then be'iun to rush forward. From f h','''!"^ '^°'"
the jTjround on which he was ridinfj, Sir De Lacy step taken
. ""^ by Kvaus.
Evans could see in profile the swift disordered
advance of Codrington's brigade, and the stop to
which the 1st Division had come. He under-
stood the danger; and, comprehending at once
that the advance of Codrington's brigade was
a movement requiring instant support, he took
upon liimself to send a message conveying his
opinion to the Duke of Cambridge.* The Divi- Ti.eist
sion went forward, and, breaking into the en- resumes hl
closures, began to work its difficult way througli
the vineyards.
But when a division of infantry extended in AVantofnea
line is marched through gardens and walled en- cation along
1 1 r ^ 1 T • ^ ^^^'^ pass-
closures, the power oi the general commanding it ingUirough
, 1 1 • 1 enclosures
must always be more or less thrown into abey-
ance, because the want of an unobstructed view
and of free lateral communication makes it im-
possible for him to know what is going on along
the whole line, or to send swift orders to the
more distant companies. For a time his author-
ity is necessarily dispersed among many; and if
tlie force is moving deliberately and in the face
of an enemy, numbers of little councils of war
* Evans sent the message by Colonel Steel, who clianced to
he near him at tlie time. Steel was Military Secretaiy, and lie
seems to have fuUilled his mission in a way which caused it to
be understood that the message he brought was an order t'lom
Lord Raghin. — A'ote to 3rf Edition.
lank of tl.o
l;]8 1!ATTLK OF Tlli: ALMA.
CHAP, will of necessity be going on hero and there, in
order to judge how best to deal with what seema
to be the state of the battle in each field, each
garden, each vineyard.
A.iv,„,renf Still, tlic Guards descended towards the bank
' Mt' with so much of the line- formation as was per-
mitted by the obstacles they had to overcome.
Upon gaining the river's side, the Coldstream
broke into open column of sections, in order to
make the most advantage of the ford ; and wlien
it reached the opposite bank it preserved its
column-formation for a time, in order to march
the more conveniently round an elbow there
formed by the river. ^Vhen this movement was
complete, the colour-sergeants went out to take
ground, and the battalion opened out into line-
formation M'ith all the precision and ceremony of
a birthday ^eview^ On the right of this battalion,
and moving with less deliberation, the Scots
Fusilier Guards got through the enclosures and
the river. On the right of that last corps there
marched the battalion of the Grenadier Guards.
The Grenadiers were a body of men so well in-
structed, and so skilfully handled, that in work-
ing their way through the enclosures they were
able to preserve all the essential elements of their
line-formation.* When they came to the bank
they looked for no ford, luit, treating the river as
* No less tliaii seven of the officers serving with this Imt-
talioTi had acted as adjntants of tlie regiment, and to this cir-
cumstance the skill with which it was carried through tlie
enclosures is in some measure ascribed.
I'.ATTLE OF TIIK ALMA. lo9
a livuok— as a brook wliicli a soldier must pass CHAP.
without picking his way * — the battalion niarchcd J_.
tlirough it in line ; f and though there were some
points where a passage was easy, others where the
soldiers had to wade deep, and some few — so they
say — where the men were put to their swimming,
still each file kept its place in the line with a
near approach to exactness. At length — but
after a painful lapse of time, for Codrington's dis-
ordered battalions were clinging all this while to
the parapet of the Great Eedoubt — the brigade
of Guards stood halted, and formed anew under
cover of the bank on the llussian side of the
river. Their people were sheltered ; but the
heads of their colours, protruding a little above
the top of tiie bank, could be seen by men look-
inff down from the redoubt.
The Highland brio-ade at this time was not Advance of
under a heavy fire, and Sir Colin Campbell land Biigida
•^ to the lelt
effected the operation of passing the river very bank of u.e
simply ; for, without attempting formal evolutions,
each of his regiments, whilst it advanced, tried to
keep np, as well as the nature of the ground
would allow, tlie rudiments of its line-formation ;
and when it gained the opposite bank, its array
was carefully restored. As soon as one of the
regiments was duly formed on tlie Russian side of
* For very good reasons, soldiers iii marching are called ujton
to go straight through brooks and pools of water withont pick-
ing their way.
t With the exception of one (the 2d) company, commanded
by Prince Edward of Saxe-Weimar, which, happening ti he
near the bridge, filed over it.
uo
BATTLK OF Till: AIM.K.
CHAP
1.
Time was
lapsing'
No siiiipoit
t>rout;!it by
tlie two
battnilioiis
which
rt'tiiaiiu-'l
uiwler
UulkT.
The cause
of this.
the river, it was luuveil forward ; and since tlie
ground presented inore obstacles towards our left
than towards our right, the brigade fell naturally,
and witliout design, into direct dchelou of regi-
ments. The 42d was in advance ; on the left of
that regiment there was the 03d, somewhat re-
fused ; and on the left of the Olid, but still fmtlier
refused, there came the 79th.
But already there was nearly an end of the
precious moments in which it was possible for the
1st Division to bring an effective support to the
troops in the Great Eedoubt.
Nor did General Buller succeed in bringing his
battalions to the rescue. We saw that the 19th
liegiment had slipped from his control and joined
with Codrington's brigade in storming the redoubt.
The two battalions which remained in his power
were the 88th and the 77tli Regiments, lie was
in person with the 88th some way above the bank
of the river ; and the 77lh, under the orders of
Colonel Kgerton, was on the extreme left of the
English infantry line. Tlie 88th and the 77tli
were not at this time under lire ; but before them,
at somewhat long distances, there were heavy
columns of Russian infantry ; and the enemy's
horsemen, though not, it seems, visible at this
moment, were known to be hovering on the left
front of the English line. Buller, however, had
not yet apprehended that the Russians were
preparing any enterprise against his left flank ;
and when he saw how matters stood in the
redoubt, he rightly determined to advance at
BATTLE OF TIIK ALMA. 141
oncG with the two battalions which remained chat.
under his control. He therefore sent an order .
to Colonel Egerton directing him at once to
move forward with tlie 77tli, and he himself
prepared to advance at the same moment with
the 8 8 til.
Colonel Egerton was a firm, able man, and he
felt the momentous importance of the duties at-
taching upon an officer who had charge of the
extreme left of our infantry line ; for it was ob-
vious that a successful flank attaclc upon the one
battalion which he commanded would Ijring into
grievous jeopardy the whole array, English and
French. The dips and liollows which marked the
hill-side towards his left, made it hard for him to
see what the enemy was intending to do ; and he
failed to infer that the Czar's renowned forces
were really abstaining from the enterprise which
seemed to be almost forced upon them by the
nakedness of our left wing, and by their strength
in the cavalry arm. At the moment M'hen Buller's
order was brought to him, Colonel Egerton was so
deeply impressed with a sense of the danger which
he had to withstand in this part of the field, that
— deliberately, and with a firmness which might
have won him great praise if the actual course of
events had brought him his justification — he took
upon himself a grave burthen.* He took upon
himself to say that, in the circumstances in which
* Colonel Egerton was the brilliant officer wlio, with only
four companies of his 77th Kcgimcnt, proved able to rxert a
strong sway over the issue of the great Inkorman battle.
112 r.ATTLH OF Tin; Al.MA.
CHAP, lie stood, lie ought not to obey the uidcr. This
'. answer the aide-de-camp carried back to General
Buller. Ikiller was a near-sighted man;* and
being, it would seem, distrustful of what had been
his own impression of the enemy's attitude, ho
acquiesced in Colonel Egcrton's decision, allowed
the 77th to remain where it was, and not only
refrained from advancing with the 88th, but
threw the regiment into square, as though it were
about to be attacked by cavalry, f
XXIV.
st.ite of So when the men of Codrington's force looked
the icdjubt. back to wlience they came, and when also they
looked to their left rear, they saw they were alone
— still alone — upon th(> liillside. Then such of
them as had the instinct of war began to under-
stand that the blood of their comrades had been
shed in vain.
* It hns already been snid that Sir Gcorf^e Brown, wlio coni-
inandcd tlie Division, ami Codrington, who commanded ils 1st
brigade, were both of them iiear-siglitcd. Tlie Liglit Division
was the force wliieh liad to feel and fight its way to tlie key of
the position ; and it was an error to allow it to be carried into
action by tliree near-siglitcd generals.
f It seems that the order to fonn square was carried (o nil
the three regiments of the brigade, including the 19th, and that
a wing of the 77th was at one moment conifilyiiig with it. The
iidicers of the 19th, however, were apparently so convinced of
the unfitness of the order, that they deliberately disobeyed it.
Lieutenant Lidwill of the 6th company was told to pass down
the word to 'square on the left centre company,' but he says: —
• I .saw it was madness, and would not pass on tlie order to the
' 7th and 8th companica.'
j;attle of the al:^ia. 113
For they were only clusters of men wiLlioui the en a r.
strencfth of order: and masses of infantry, in a _,
perfect state of formation, were heavily impend-
inf]; over them. The columns which were the Battery nr>
• 1 T 1 1 ■ 1 1 tlic Innlicr
nearest to them were m the dip behind the re- siorosof
■ 1 J. theliill
doubt, and so placed that, \\'ithout any danger to brouKiit to
them, the Russian battery which had been planted men.
higlier up on the side of the Kourgane Hill could
throw its fire into the site of the redoubt. The
guns of this battery — the one that had brought
Colonel Lawrence and his aide-de-camp, and
perhaps many more, to the ground — were soon
brought to bear upon those of our soldiery who
stood within the redoubt ; and tliis fire, after
killing and woundhig several men, drove the
rest to seek cover by betaking themselves to
the outer side of the parapet. Their move-
ment, though it wanted the sanction of orders,
was scarcely M'rong or unsoldierly ; for, since
the men were without formation, their duty be-
came like the duty of skirmishers, and the para-
pet of the redoubt supplied that kind of shelter
which the need of the moment demanded. Yet
the movement looked like the beginning of a
retreat, and apparently for that reason mainly
General Codrington strove to check it,* for being
at the moment on the outside of the work, he
for the second time put his horse at the parapet,
* We saw liiin at one moment busied in establishing some of
Ixis men on the outside of the parapet, but it did not of course
at all follow that he would approve tlie reflux movement of
those soldiers who being within the work now began to pour
out of it.
Mi
I'.ATTLi: OF J'HK ALMA.
C II A P.
I.
Onr men
lodgft them-
selves out-
side the
parapet.
and again enleied the redonbt, with a hope that
tlie men would follow him in once more. But,
this time, his example was little observed; for
almost every man, being driven by want of for-
mation to rely upon his own means of making a
stand, was busied with the work of settling him-
self down as well as he could for a stubborn de-
fence; and it was plain (as Codrington himself
had been showing the men some few minutes be-
fore) that the best ground for making a stand was
the foot of the parapet on its outer side.
When good infantry soldiers, in the immediate
presence of a powerful enemy, are disordered, but
still undaunted, the slightest rudiment of a field-
work is of infinite value to it — not simply nor
chiefly on account of the shelter which it affords,
but rather — because it gives a base and nucleus
for that coherence which is endangered by the
want of formation. If our men, then lying or
kneeling along the foot of the parapet, had been
well covered at the flanks, it would have been
their duty to hold the ground firmly against even
a great body r)f infantry attacking them in front.
But on either flank, as well as in front of Ihe
lengthened crowd of English soldiery which lay
clustering about the parapet, the enemy's masses
were gathered. On their right rear there was the
double-battalion column of the Kazan corps still
engaged with the Royal Fusiliers. On their left
and left front, there were the two remaining Ijat-
talions of the Kazan corps and the four battalions
of the Sousdal corps ; l)ut in their immediate
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 1-15
front, and posted in the hollow behind the re- chat
doubt, they had before them the four superb bat- ,
talious of the Vladimir Iiegiment. These forces The forces
. tiathcrcci
weve supported by the four battalions of the against
Ouglitz corps, which stood massed m one column
on a higher slope of the Kourgan^ Hill. The two
battalions of sailors also were in this part of the
lield ; and, except as regards his loss of an advan-
tageous site for a battery, and his loss too of one
gun and one howitzer, the discomfiture up to this
time sustained had not lessened his strength in
artillery, ]Moreover, 12 squadrons of Hussars
and 11 sotnias of Cossacks stood drawn up close
at hand on the enemy's extreme right ; so that
(omitting the Kazan column, which was occupied
with the lioyal Fusiliers) there were impending
over our disordered soldiery, then kneeling or
lying down by the parapet of the redoubt, IG
battalions of infantry in a state of perfect forma-
tion, supported by powerful batteries, and by 2700
horse.
And by this time there had sprung up amongst warUke
1 -r> • • o 11 p 1 T7- indignation
the Paissian infantry on the slopes oi the Hour- of the
. . Russian
gane Hill a sentiment of warlike indignation, infantry
^ ® on the
Any Hussian officer who had been standing on Konrgans
*' " Hill.
ground high enough to command a view of the
river, must have seen that, from the moment of
their first onset on the left bank, the troops which
stormed the redoubt were an isolated, and, for the
most part, a disordered force ; and even for some
minutes after seeing them carry the work, he
would be unable to make out that any supports
VOL. in. K
MG i;attle of tiif, alma.
cii A r. iiiovi'd uj) fVoiu tlic liver were coming as yet to
' tlieir aid. Naturally he would be shamed to think
that many thousands of the once famous Russian
infantry had been yielding up the Great liedoubt
to a body which might almost be called a mere
{lush of skirmishers. Besides, it was known by
this time in some of the Russian battalions, that
of the ])ieces which had armed the redoubt, two
were wanting, and to recover these there arose a
burning desire. Unless the stain was to be last-
ing, it seemed clear that the red-coats still cling-
ing to the dismantled redoubt must be driven at
once down the hill.
Movement Propcllcd, it would sccm, l)y this warlike senti-
litz coiuiiM). ment, the great column formed of the Ouglitz
battalions, and posted on the higli ground above
the redoubt, began to descend towards our people;
and for a few moments it came on, hot with zeal
or anger, the men of the front ranks discharging
vain, ])assionate shots whilst tlicy marched, and
young soldiers in the centre of the column shoot-
ing wildly into the air above them. Soon, how-
ever, this body was halted.*
But it was in the great Vladimir column that
* No mention of tliis suddenly arrested advance is niudc in
the Russian accounts, and I imagine that it was a movement
spontaneously undertaken by the colonel, but soon afterwards
stopped by orders from some one of higher authority. The
movement was observed liy Englisli otlicers so placed as to com-
mand a view of this ]iart of the fuld, but it has been only by
comparing their testimony with my knowledge of the position
occupied by eacli llussian corps, that I have been aide to infer
the identity of the battalions they saw with thoic of the Oug-
litz regiiuent.
15ATTLE OF THE ALMA. 1 17
there spriui;4 up tlie warlike spirit wliicli was des- cii a r.
tilled to bring the foot soldiery of Russia and of '. —
England into a closer strife. The column, we tiio^v"adimir
know, was a mass composed of the four bat-"^""'""'
talious of the Vladimir corps ; and although it
stood near to the English soldiery lying clustered
along the outer side of the parapet, still, because
drawn up in the dip behind the rear of the earth-
work, it could not be perfectly seen by even such
of our men as were standing up, and could not
be seen at all by those who w(n-c lying doAvn or
kneeling.
For the honour of having led this high-mettled
column against English infantry two men con-
tend. Erom the time when Prince jSlentschikoff
rode off towards the sea, Prince Gortschakoff had
been left in command of the whole of the forces
opposed to the English ; and General Kvetzinski,
who commanded the Division to which the Vladi-
mir battalions belonged, was under Prince Gorts-
cliakoff's orders. Each of these — the two last-
mentioned — Generals says that (without knowing
of the presence of the other) he gave orders for the
advance of the column, and led it on in person.
Their statements may perhaps be reconciled; for it
is possible that Gortschakoff and Kvetzinski — the
one riding with the left, the other with the right, of
the column — may have, both of them, done what
each of them said that he did. In that view of
the matter the coincidence would be accounted
for by supposing that the resolve of each of the
two Generals sprang from the same cause — sprang
HS BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, ill I'act iVom the warlike aniier wliicli was lieav-
1 . .
'. ing the general mass. I am, liowever, inclined to
believe that Prince Gortschakofr is mistaken in
his statement ; * and that the impulse he gave to
the Vladimir battalions was one given some min-
utes later, and after the movement now spoken
of. Be this as it may, it is certain enough that
— either alone, or jointly with Prince Gortscha-
koff — Kvetzinski led on the colunni.
These troops of the 16th Division had been
touched with the warlike lire which a patriot
priesthood can draw from Gospels, Epistles, and
Psalms. With the baggage of the Division there
was carried an image of the blessed Sergius; and
when these troops were ordered to the south, the
Archbishop of Moscow had taken care to whet
them for the strife. 'Children of the Czar' — so
ran the Primate's blessing — ' Children of the Czar
' our father, and Paissia our mother, my warrior
' brethren ! The Czar, your country, the Christian
' faith, call you to brave deeds, and the prayers
' uf the Church and country are with }uu. . . .
' Should it be the will of God that you too face
' the foe, forget not that you are doing battle for
' the most pious Czar, for our beloved country,
' for holy Church, against infidels, against per-
' secutors of the Christian faith — pei'sccutors of
' men united to us by ties of I'cligion and of blood
' — insulters of those who bow before the Holy
* Places, sanctified by the birth, passion, and as-
* 1 fouiid thi-s bhJief upon a comparison of Prince Gortscha-
kofT's .statements witli tlie known facts.
BATTLE OF THE AI.MA. 149
• cension of Christ. BlessiiK^ and honour to liini chap.
I
• who conquers ' Blessing and liappiness to him 1_
' who, with faith in God, and love for his Czar
' and country, offers up his life as a sacrifice ! It
' is written in tlie Scriptures, concerning those of
' olden times who fought for their country, " By
' "faith were kingdoms conquered" (Heb. xi. 33).
* Now, by faith you too shall be conquerors. Our
' most holy father Sergius whilome blessed our
' victorious war against the enemies of Russia.
' His image was borne in your ranks in the days
* of the Emperor Alexis, of Peter the Great, and,
' finally, in the great war against twenty nations
' in the reign of Alexander the First. That sacred
' form journeys with you also as a token of his
' fervent and beseeching prayers to God on your
' behalf. Take unto yourselves, moreover, the
triumphal war-cry of the Czar and prophet
' David, "In God is my salvation and glory ! " ' *
The Vladimir column came on. It moved slow-
ly as though it were held in by some kind of awe
or doubt. Still it moved, and without firing a
shot ; for the orders were not to fire but to cliarge
with the bayonet. Huge and grey, the mass crept
gliding up the slope winch divided it from our
soldiery.
Our men, gathered round tlie parapet, were
kneeling or lying down ; and being thus low they
could not see into the dip which lay at a little
distance before them ; but mounted officers, of
course, could see farther, and even men on foot
* Psalm li. 8 ; 'Eastern Papers,' part vii. p. 50.
150 BATTLE OF TIIK A1..M.V.
CHAP, (especially lliose near to oitlier ilank of tlie re-
il doubt), if they stood up i'or a moment to gain a
wider view, could see a whole field of bayonet
points, ranged close as corn, and seeming to grow
taller and taller. And though none of our men
knew the strength of the column which was clos-
ing upon them, yet, sometimes from what he him-
self saw, but more commonly by hearsay, almost
every man came to know that towards the part
of the parapet where he lay there was a mass of
Eussian soldiery coming.
The great Vladimir column at lengtli emerged
from the dip, and still withholding its fire, con-
tinued to move slowly f(jrward, so that present-
ly our men lying down, with their rifles levelled
across the parapet, and their eyes a little above
its top, were face to face with the approaching
mass.
Whether owing to any high quality of the soul,
or to a want of imagination, or only, after all, to
a certain hardness of temperament, it is certain
that the slow approach of massed infantry does
not weigh on the hearts of our people as it does
on the troops of the Continent ; and, when our
soldiers are formed in their English array, they
see in a column opposing them a sensitive, frail
human structure which, although indeed strong
potentially, is nevertheless for the moment, and
until broken up or deployed, a mere victim, a
manacled giant, against men firing into its depths
from a largely extended front. Even now, though
our men lay in clusters without formation, they
BATTLE OF TIIK ALMA. 151
were ready wiougli to begin shooting into the chap.
column ; and those who first caught siglit of '
the liussian helmets were going to deliver their
fire, when suddenly they were checked by a
voice which implored every man to stay his
hand.
When troops are about to be overpowered, con- confusing
fusing rumours flit round them, ihe voice wliicn amongst our
° . . soldiery.
had stayed the fire of our men was a voice crying unauthenuo
out, 'The column is French !— the column is ^[^.^to^
' French! Don't fire, men ! For God's sake don't ^'''^'"^"•
' fire ! ' At this moment Colonel Chester was
sitting in his saddle close to the redoubt, and
when he saw the soldiery beginning to catch the
belief that the approaching column was French,
he eagerly strove to undeceive them. Enforcing
his words by gesture, he was impatiently moving
his uplifted sword, as though he would say to
those who might see without l)eing able to hear,
' No ! no ! nonsense ! the column is not French —
' it is an enemy's column. Fire into it ! fire into
' it ! ' Whilst thus striving to correct the mistake
he was struck first by one shot, and then almost
instantly by another. Upon receiving the first
shot, he seemed to put his hand to the wound,
but when the second shot struck him he dropped
from his horse and fell dead.
Repeated again and again, the prohibition
against opening fire travelled fast along the line ;
and presently it was further impressed, for a
bugler of the 19th, under orders from a mounted
officer, began to sound the ' cease firing,'
152 r.ATTLE OF TMK ALMA.
CHAT. Ouv men, obeying tlie voice thns enforced Ly
• the appeal of tlie bugle, Avithheld tlieir fire and
remained still. The belief that the column must
be French was confirmed, if not caused, by ob-
serving that it delivered no fire ; and although
Kvetzinski has said that the front-rank men had
brought down their muskets as though for a
charge with the bayonet,* still the slow, formal
movement of tlie approaching mass was so little
like what the English regard as a 'charge,' that
our people, so far as I know, never thought of
accounting for tlie silence of the enemy's firelocks
by suggesting that his movement was intended to
be an attack with the l)ayonet. The Vladimir
mass now halted,-|- as if from a suspicion of some
snare, or perhaps from a dread of the unknown ;
and this indeed was natural enough, for although
but imperfectly seeing our recumbent soldiers, the
front-rank men of the column could by this time
discern many forage-caps and a crowd of English
faces of a fresh-coloured hue very strange to their
eyes, and besides, the muzzles of rifies levelled
thickly across the parapet. From mistake on one
* His expression, as rendered from the Eussian into French,
is, 'I'arme an bras, prete a la haionette.'
+ The Russian accounts do not speak of this lialt. They re-
present the whole advance of the cohiiiin as a bayonet-charge,
and it seems quite true tliat the cohimn really witliliekl its fire ;
but it would be a mistake to suppose tliat tlie forward move-
ment of this body was marked with any of the swiftness or vio-
lence commonly associated with the idea of a ' charge.' To Eng-
lish eyes and English ears the slow, cumbrous advance of the Vla-
dimir column was as different from a ' bayonet charge ' as a fune-
ral is from a horse-race, or a short, swift 'bur'^it' with the houndi
BATTLE OF THE AT,MA. 153
side, and misgiving on the other, there liaJ come chap.
to be a strange pause ; vet not along the whole '
line ; for, either with a part of the Yladimir
column or else with some other body of troops,
two or three of the companies of the 33d were
exchanging at this time a sharp fire. The men of
the column took the fancy of pouring the main
volume of their shot towards the ground where
the colours of the 33d were upraised. The col-
ours were new ; and, as though the mere richness
of their crimson folds were enough to draw the
eye and tlie aim of the Russian musketeer, they
were riddled in two or three minutes with num-
bers of balls. Of those who stood near them a
large proportion were struck down.*
General Codrington, seeing that the fruits of
the exploit performed by his brigade were going
to be lost for want of supports, had already sent
his aide-de-camp, Campbell, to press the advance
of the Scots Fusilier Guards, the battalion most
directly in his rear. But the very moments then
passing were the moments charged with the result,
and tliere were no other and later moments that
could ever be used in their stead.
It is said — but my faith in men's impressions
of what passed at this minute is M-anting in
strength — it is said that one of the heavy columns
which the enemy had on his extreme right was
* I do not see anything in tlie Russian narratives which I
can identify with the combat in which a part of the 33d was
engaged, and I have not been able to say wliich of tlie Russian
corps it was with which the 33d was at this time exchanging
fire.
154 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
ciiAi'. now seen to be marching upon the left flank of
_*_; the English soldiery who lay clustered along the
parapet of the redoubt ; * and it seems there are
grounds for believing that the left of our line was
the spot where a conviction of the necessity of
retiring was first acted upon. According to testi-
mony which seems to be trustworthy, a mounted
officer f rode up to a bugler of the 19th Regiment,
A imgier aud Ordered him to sound the ' retire.' The man
*raire.' '^ obeyed ; and buglers along the whole line, from
left to right, took up and repeated the signal,
noui.ie But the instinct of self-preservation, no less than
r"m;iinin1[ tlic natural courage and tenacity of the suldier,
we're.'' "^ uiadc almost every man of the force very unwill-
ing to abandon the ground ; for it happened that
at this time a brisk sliower of missiles was passing
over the heads of our men without doing them
harm ; and hearing how thickly the balls were
raining into the ground behind them, they knew
tliat a retreat would not only be an abandonment
of ground dearly won, but also would bring them
at once under a heavy fire. So strong M'as their
conviction of the expediency of iiolding fast to the
* The Russian accounts do not confirm this belief.
t Afterwards the bugler described the officer in a way wliich
might have enabled a court of inquiry to identify him. I may
say that he was not an officer of the regiment to which the
bugler belonged, that he was not a general officer, and that he
did not deliver the ordjr as coming from any one other than
himself. The incident goes far to justify the opinion of officers
who think that (unless it is strictly confined to the business
of guiding skirmishers) the use of a bugle during an action is
dangerous. See in the Appendix a Note respecting the often-
repeated 'apparition of the unknown mounted officer.'
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 155
ground where they hiy, tliat the sounding of tlie cilAF,
* retire ' was believed to have originated in some '
error; and in order that they might determine
what should be done, the officers of several regi-
ments, but more especially of the 23d, gatliered
into a group and began to consult together.
Being firm, proud men, with a great self-respect, conference
• 1 ,. -I 1 1 o*^ officers at
they did not, it seems, crouch lor shelter under the parapet.
the parapet whilst exchanging counsel, and, on
the contrary, remained standing upright, but under
so thick a flight of balls that several — nay, they
say almost all of them — were struck down and Their fate,
killed.* As before, so after the conference our
officers continued to say that the sounding of the
'retire' must have been a mistake, and that tlie
force ought to hold its ground.
But then, again, and from tlie same quarter as The 're-
before, a bugle sounded the ' retire,' and again, as sounaed"
before, the signal w\as taken up along the line.
The repetition of the signal seemed to make it
almost certain that the order must be authentic ;
but the troops were yet slow to persuade thcm-
* I shall presently give the names of tlic officers who were
killed ill the 23d and the other regiments which stormed the
redoubt, hut 1 cannot undertake to say which of them fell at
this time. In general, it seems to be almost beyond the power of
human testimony to lix the time and the spot at which an officer
fiills when he is killed in battle. The difficulty is occasioned,
not by the dearth, but by the vast abundance of testimony —
testimony all seeming to be perfectly trustworthy, yet strangely
contradictory. It will be seen, however, that the number of
officers killed in the 23d was very great ; and there is an im-
pression tlxat no small proportion of them met their death in
the way abuve stated.
156 13ATTLK OF Till-: AI.M.V.
CHAP, selves tluil this was tlie case, and iliey still
' lingered at the parapet, 'i'hen a sergeaot of the
23d, standing upright iu order to make himself
better heard, told the men tliat they had twice
Our soldiery heard the 'retire' sounded, and that they must
lit I eat from i ■> • ■, , ■.
ii.e redoubt, do tlicir dutv and obey. Whilst he spoke he was
shot down and killed. But it was now judged by
officers and men that a signal twice made and
twice carried on along tlie line from regiment to
regiment was not to be neglected. The retreat
began; and the men, quitting the shelter of the
breastwork, fell back into the open ground, and
incurred the fire v/hich was pelting into the slope
beneath.
As the advance had been, so also the retreat was
for the most part without order, but for the most
part also it was not hurried. Our soldiers in their
retreat took care to ply the enemy with fire ; and
they picked up and carried off with them those of
our wounded officers and men whom they found
lying wounded on tlie slope. The retreat, speak-
ing generally, was like the movement of skirmish-
ers when they find themselves recalled to their
battalions by sound of bugle.
There was, however, one part of the retreating
force in which the men had become thronged to-
gether, and these presently we shall see face about
with a mind to protract the struggle.*
Upon this crowd, and upon the lesser clusters
of our soldiery then retreating down the hillside,
• Tlie.se, I believe, were chiefly men of the 23d and 9Ctb
regiineuts.
BATTLE UF THE ALMA. 157
the enemy might have iuHicted grave losses; but chap.
apparently there was some spell which hound him ; _ ,
for when the Vladimir column had moved forward
to the front of the breastwork, it used a strange
abstinence, attempting no movement in pursuit,
and coming at once to a halt. Of the two missing
pieces of ordnance which tlie enemy had yearned
to recover, one, tliey saw, had disappeared;*
whilst the other (the howitzer) was found lying
on the ground dismounted, and it proved so un-
wieldy that Kvetzinski says liis Vladimir men
were unable to drag it away. It renuuned in the
redoubt, -f
During this conHict the five battalions J which
stormed the redoubt had undergone cruel slaugh-
ter. In the 23d rie^iment, besides Colonel Chester, lo.ss.s of
Wvnn, Evans, Conolly, Eadcliife, loung, An- ments which
•> ' ' "^ 1 -n 1 stormed tlie
struther, and Butler, and 3 sergeants, were killed ; work,
and Campbell, Hopton, Bathurst, Sayer,§ and
Applethwaite, and 9 sergeants, were wounded. Of
the rank and file 40 were killed and 139 wounded.
In the 33d, Lieutenant Montagu and 3 ser-
geants were killed, and Colonel Blake, Major
* This was the sliot-giui, now at Woolwich, that w:is taken by
Captain Bell.
t And is the howitzer before spoken of as being now at Wool-
wich.
t These five battalions, observe, were not quite identical witli
the ti-oops of equal strength which followed Codrington to the
top of the bank. They no longer had with them the Royal
Fusiliers, but had received the accessions which brought back
their strength to that of ' five battalions.'
§ Sayer W'ls one of those struck down by that salvo-like di*'
charge wliich preceded the dismantling of the redoubt.
158 UATTLE OF TIIK ALMA.
C'iiAi'. Gou-li, Captain Fitzgerald, Wallis, Worthington,
'• Siiee, and Greenwood, and IG sergeants, were
wounded. * Of the rank and file 52 were killed,
and 17:2 were wounded.
In Llie 95th, Colonel Webber Smith, Dowdall,
Eddington, the younger Eddington, Polhill,
Kingsley, Braybrook, and 3 sergeants were killed ;
and Ilunie, Ueyland, AVing, Sargent, JNIacdonald,
Garrard, liraybrook, Brooke, Boothby, Bazalgette,
Gordon, and 12 sergeants, were wounded. Of the
rank and file 42 were killed and 1 1 G wounded.
In tlic 19th, Stoekwell and Wardlaw were
killed ; and Cardew, Saunders, INI'Gee, Warden,
and Currie, and 4 sergeants, wounded. Of the
rank and file 39 were killed and 170 wounded.
In the 2d battalion of llilles, 2 sergeants were
killed, and the Earl of Ei'rol and 1 sergeant wounded.
Of the rank and file 9 were killed and 37 wounded.
So, of the five battalions which had stormed the
redoubt, there was a loss, in killed and wounded,
of about 100 officers and sergeants, and 800 men.
XXV.
But wliat was the h\)v]\ which bound the Czar's
* Coloni-1 T51iil<e would iKit report his wound, lest the iiccouut
sliould iilarin liis wife and lamily. His hor.se was struck in
three places. Siree, though liadly wouuded, insisted upon re-
maining out on the hillside all night, in order that men in a
worse condition should he first attended to. Wallis was badly
wounded, but he tied a handkerchief round the place, and re-
mained with his regiment to the close of the battle. Worth-
ington died from the amputation whicli was necessitated by tlie
wound lie received.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 159
commanders? und wliy did tliey throwback the chat
gifts which seemed to he brought them by the '. —
fortune of battle? S'lyJ^V'''
When our stormiug-force under Codrington was ?^^';,^g''f,^;;;;\'
ascending the ghicis in a crowd— in a crowd torn oM^
through and through by grape and canister — how
came it that the enemy conhl suddenly mahe np
his mind to stop the massacre and dismantle his
Great lledoubt ?
"When the remnant of our storming-force was
Hocking back down the hil], why did the enemy
spare from destroying it, and bring to a halt his
triumphant Vladimir column ?
Having several thousands of troops between
the Causeway and the Kourgan^ Hill, wliy did
the Ptussian Generals suffer Lacy Yea still to keep
his stand on open ground with one disordered
battalion ?
AVe saw that when jNIentscliikoff, disturbed by
the report of Bosquet's flank movement, rode off
in great haste towards the sea, Prince Gortscha-
koff was left in command of all that part of the
PtUSsian army which confronted tlie English.
Kvetzinski, the brave and able general who com-
manded the Division on the Kourgane Hill, was
under the orders of Prince Gortschakoff ; and as
Ion" as the absence of the Commander-in-chief
was protracted, Gortschakoff was the officer who
had to answer for the defence of the Pass, and of
the whole position thence extending to the ex-
treme right of the Paissian army. Every pait of
the ground thus committed to Prince Gortscha-
160 BATTLE OF TIIK ALMA.
CHAP, koffs care was precious, but the Kouigaue Hill
.. ^' was the key of the whole position on the Alma.
Jhere, and there only, the ground had been en-
trenched ; there, and there only, heavy guns had
been planted. That barren hill had become the
very gage for which the Great Powers of the ^Yest
and the Czar of All the liussias were to join in
a strife computed to last many days. Prince
;Mentschikolf himself had so judged it. Estab-
lishing his headquarters on the slope overlooking
the Great Ptedoubt, and so disposing his troops
that whilst standing there he could exercise an
immediate personal control over two-thirds of his
whole force, he had intended that every move-
ment of this part of the field should be under his
own eyes. It might well be deemed certain that
any one of Prince Mentschikoff's lieutenants en-
trusted, during the absence of hi.s general, with
this great charge, would be tenacious of the
ground. As a general in high conmiand, he
would act upon the knowledge that the hill was
vital to the whole position : as an officer command-
ing troops placed in a ibrtified work, he would be
taught by the punctilio of his profession to hold
his entrenchments, even at great sacrifice, until
the weight of his charge should be taken from him
by an order from the commander of the forces.
But there was a whim of the Emperor Nicholas
which tended to weaken and disjierse the author-
ity of any man in command of his army. Longing
always to make Wellington an example for his
generals, but mistaking the gist of the saying that
' BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 161
'the Duke never lost a gun,' Nicholas gave his chaf.
commanders to understand that the loss of a piece '
of ordnance would be likely to bring them into
disgrace.* The result of such an intimation was
just what a more sagacious prince would have
easily foreseen. The commander who received
the warning took good care to hand it down — to
hand it all down the steps of the military hier-
archy ; and every general of division, every bri-
gadier, nay, every officer who commanded a bat-
tery, was evidently made to understand that,
happen what might, he must not lose a piece of
artillery. In other words, every such officer was
encouraged to deem the loss of a 'position' less
calamitous than the loss of a gun, and thus
brought into the mood for commencing a retreat,
which perhaps under some conditions might carry
with it the retreat of the whole army.
It was therefore very natural that the anxiety
which had seized upon the mind of Prince Ment-
schikoff should not only extend to Prince Gort-
schakofF and to General Kvetzinski, but also to
the artillery officers who commanded the Cause-
way batteries and the guns in the Great Redoubt,
Now, from the moment when Prince Mentschikoff
rode off towards the sea, he had never reappeared
in the Pass, nor on the Kourgan^ Hill; he had
* The fact of the Duke never having lost a gun in action is a
superb and summary proof that his career was uncheckered by
the loss of a battle ; but his avoidance of the loss of guns was
not the cause, but the effect and the nroof, of his ascendancy in
war. The Duke would have scorned the notion of risking the
loss of a battle for the sake of keeping liis guns safe.
VOL. IIL L
1G2 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, sent no good tidings, and apparently had de-
' spatched no orders or directions of any kind.*
With every moment the just grounds for alarm
were increasing ; and when the foremost divisions
of tlie British army sprang to their feet and
rapidly advanced along their whole line, the Rus-
sian generals and commanders of batteries had
to cast in their minds and see how far their desire
to hold fast a position very precious to the army
and to the honour of the empire could be made to
consist with the absolute safety of a few pieces of
ordnance. They were about to be assailed by the
English army. But this was not all they had to
look for. The continued detention of Prince Ment-
schikoff in that part of the position which con-
fronted the French, gave ground for the fear that
an evil crisis must there be passing. The feai
would be that Bosquet's turning movement
against the Russian left was producing its full
effect, and that the tide of war, rolling up along
the line of the Russian position, had set in from
west to east.
If men were filled with this dread — a dread
well justified by inference fairly drawn at the
time, though not by actual facts — it would be to
the Teh^graph Height that they would bend their
inquiring eyes, and there they would gaze with
minds prepared to learn that the French, march-
* I think I might have almost ventured to leave out the
'apparently,' for altliough the narratives of Gortschakoff and
Kvetzinski do not in terms declare that they received no orders,
the tenor of tlieir statements is all but equivalent to actual
assertion.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 163
ing eastward, had doubled up the Eussian left chap.
wing, and were coming to ground from which 1
they would look down triumphant into the flank
of the Causeway batteries. Suddenly, to men thus
expectant of a dreaded calamity, there was pre-
sented a sight well fitted to confirm their worst
fears — nay, even to make them imagine that the
whole tenor of their duty was changed. For one Apparition
of the high knolls jutting up from the eastern on a°knoTii
slopes of the Telegraph Height, and closely over- the Russian
looking the Eussian reserves, became crowded all ^°^' ^°'^'
Sit once with a gay looking group of horsemen,
whose hats and white plumes showed tliat they
were Staff officers. Wliat made the apparition
seem the more fatal was that it was deep in the
very heart of the Eussian lines, and even some-
what near to the ground where Prince Mentschi-
koff had posted his reserves. It could be seen
that the horsemen wore coats of dark blue — the
colour of the French uniform. They were exactly
on the ground where the van of the French
army might hope to be if it had achieved a
signal victory over the left wing of the Eussian
army. It was hardly to be imagined possible that
the Allies could have a numerous staff in that
part of the field without being there in great
strength. Even a tranquil and cautious observer
of the apparition could hardly have failed to infer
that the French, carrying all before them, had
marched through and through from west to east,
and made good their way into the centre, nay,
almost into the rear, of the Eussian position,
164 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. Oppressed by this belief, Russian officers -would
. be left to think that if tliey stood bound to pro-
vide against the possibility of losing their guns,
the time they had for saving them was beginning
to run very short.
The divisional general who was in command
on the Kourgan^ Hill does not allege that he had
any autliority from Prince Gortschakoff or from
the commander of the forces to remove the guns
which armed the Great Eedoubt. What he says
is, that the defeat of the Kazan battalions by
the English troops left the battery exposed, and
necessitated its withdrawal.* General Kvet-
zinski, however, was the master of sixteen prime
battalions, of which twelve were at this time un-
touched. At the time when the order must have
been given for the removal of the guns, the defeat
which one of his Kazan columns had sustained
was nothing which, in the eyes of a man so firm
as he was, would seem to justify despair.*}- Yet
* Tliis is what Kvetzinski says : ' During this time masses
' of En.L^lish troops were directing their steps towards the regi-
' ment of the Grand Duke Michael (tlie Kazan regiment). The
' batteries of our first lines began firing violently. Shells and
' missiles worked their bloody way tlirough tiie lines of the
' enemies, but they immediately re-formed their lines, and,
' under cover of a strong line of bayonets and their battery then
' standing behind the smoky ruins of IJourliouk, they hastened
' to force their way over the ford in order to reach tlie breast-
' work. The Kazan regiment bravely met them, but, tormented
* by the destroying fire of the enemy, and having lost a fright-
* ful amount of men, was obliged to give way under the superior
' number of the enemy. Tlie battery, being thus left exposed,
' was obliged to move.'
+ Up to the same time when Kvetzinskl dismantled the re-
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 165
to remove these guns was to abandon the key of chap.
the position on tlie Alma. It is hard to imagine '. —
that Kvetzinski could have brought himself to
take such a step without trying resistance, unless
he had been in some measure governed by an in-
culcated dread of losing guns, and also by what
he wrongly imagined to be the state of the battle
on the other side of the Causeway. Be this as
it may, it is certain that, within some fifteen
minutes from the time when the horsemen were
first seen on the knoll, the Great Redoubt was
dismantled.
The riders whose sudden appearance on the
knoll thus scared or misled the enemy were a
group of perhaps eighteen or twenty Englishmen.
How came it that they were sitting unmolested
in their saddles and contently adjusting their
field-glasses in the heart of the Russian position ?
At the time when Lord Raglan despatched to The road
*= '■ whifih Lord
his leading: divisions the final order to advance, Ragiantook
" when he had
he was riding between the French and the Eng- ordered tiie
" _ ^ advance of
lish armies, and was close to a road or track which i^s infantry
led down towards a ford below the burning village.
Impelled by his desire for a clear view of the
coming struggle, and guided only by Fortune, or
by the course of the track, he rode down briskly
into the valley, followed close by his Staff, but
leaving our troops in his rear. He soon reached,
doubt, tlie only defeat whicli the Kazan corps had sustained
was the one inflicted upon two of its battalions by the 19th
Regiment and the left companies of the 23d : see ante. The
defeat of the other two battalions — the battalions engaged with
\.acy Yea — had not then occurred.
166 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, soon passed through the vineyards, and gained
™ '- — the bank of the river.
The stream at this spot flowed rapidly, break-
ing against a mass of rock, which so far dammed
it back as to form on the upper side of it a pool
about four feet deep. One of the Staff rode into
the stream at that point, and his horse nearly lost
his footing. Lord Raglan, almost at the same mo-
ment, took the river on the right or lower side
of the rock, and crossed it without any trouble.
Thougli he was parted at this time from his own
troops, there were several Frencli soldiers near
him. They were a part of the cliain of skirmish-
ers which covered the left flank and left front
of Prince Napoleon's Division. Tliey seemed
to be engaged with some of the enemy's sharp-
shooters, whom they were able to discern through
the foliage ; for they were sheltering themselves
behind vineyard walls, watching moments for
firing, and receding in order to load, or cautiously
peering forward. They looked surprised when
Lord liaglan, with the group which followed him,
rode down and passed them. More than one of
them, sagacious and curious, paused in his load-
ing, and stood gazing with ramrod half-down as
though he were trying to make out how it ac-
corded with the great science of war that the
English General and his Staff should be riding
through the skirmishers, and entering without
his battalions into the midst of the enemy's do-
minions.
Though unseen by our officers, the Kussian
BA.TTLE OF THE ALMA. 1G7
sharpshooters, who had been exchanging shots chap.
with the French riflemen, were not far away. L.
Of this they gave proof. Leslie dropped out of
his saddle and fell to the ground. His startled
horse made a move much as though he were
blundering at a grip, and the fall seemed at first
sight like a fall in hunting ; but a rifle-ball had
entered Leslie's shoulder. Nearly at the same time
Weare, another of the Staff, was struck down.
There was not a heavy fire, but the Russian
sharpshooters had been patiently duelling with
the French skirmishers, and of course, when they
saw Lord Eagian and his plumed followers, they
seized the occasion for easier shooting, and tried
to bring down two or three of the gay cavalcade.
After gaining the left bank of the river. Lord
Eagian speeded on into a kind of gully towards
his right, and there for a moment he had no one
very near him, except one man who had crossed
the stream next after him ; for the rest of the
horsemen, when they reached the dry ground,
had borne rather towards their left. Some one,
however, from that quarter cried out, ' This seems
' a better way, my lord ; ' and Lord Eagian, then
turning, rejoined the rest of the Staff, and took
the path recommended. I do not know who the
officer was who advised this road.* He has pos-
sibly forgotten the counsel he gave ; but if he
* The officer was Lord Burgliersh, now Lord "Westmoreland.
Colonel, now Major- General, Patton (who was present), has
been so good as to write to me stating this ; and adding, ' I
' heard the words.' — Note to 5th Edition.
168 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, remembers it, and sees how the issue was oov-
I •
, erned by taking the path which he chose, he may
suffer himself to trace the gain of a battle, with
all its progeny of events, to his few hurried
words.
The brown bay Lord Eaglan rode was of course
well broken to fire, and he had been quiet enough
during the earlier part of the action ; but now,
suddenly, his blood rose, and for all the rest of
the day he was so eager that he would hardly
suffer his rider to use a field - glass from the
saddle. The truth is, that in otlier times he
had been ridden to hounds in England,. and al-
though he had long stood careless of all that was
done by the Causeway batteries, yet when he and
his rider and the horsemen around him cantered
down into the valley, when they plunged into
the river, when they briskly dashed througli it,
and began to gallop up the steep broken ground
on the liussian side, the old hunter seemed to
think of the chase and great days in the Glouces-
tershire country.
But it was not ' Shadrach ' * alone who felt the
onward impulse. They say that there lurks in
the men of these isles a vestige of Man the
Hunter and Man the Savage, and that this, after
all, is the subtle leaven which, in spite of the
dangerous inroads of luxury, still keeps alive
the warlike spirit of the people and the freedom
which goes along with it. It was not right — nay,
if it were not that success brings justification, it
* The name of tlie horse.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 169
would have been scarcely pardonable — that a chap,
general, charged with the care of an army, should '
be under the guidance of feelings akin to the im-
pulses of the chase ; but what one has to speak
of is not of what ought to have been, but what
was. By the stir and joyous animation of the
moment, Lord Eaglan was led on into a part of
the field which he would not have sought to
reach in cold blood. He would have regarded
as nothing the mere difference between the risk
of being struck by shot in one part of the field
and the risk of being struck by shot in another ;
but he knew that, in general, it is from a point
more or less in rear of battalions actually engaged
that a chief can exercise the most constant and
the most extended control over his army; and cer-
tainly an ideal commander would not suffer him-
self to ride to so forward a spot as to run the risk
of losing the government of his troops for many
miimtes together in the critical period of an
action : but the horseman who now rode his
hunter across the valley of the Alma, and indul-
gently gave him his head, was not an ideal person-
age, but a man of flesh and blood, with many very
English failings. ' Avant tout jc suis gentilhom/me
Anglais' was the preface of the fierce message
sent by the then foremost man of the world to the
King of France;* and certainly in the nature of
that ' gentilhomme Anglais ' the wilfulness is so
firmly set tliat no true sample of the breed can
* To Louis tlie Eighteenth in the summer of 1815, shortly
after his second restoration.
170 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, be altered, and altered down, to suit a pattern.
• The State must dispense with his services or
take him as he is.
Body and soul, Lord Raglan was so made
by nature, that, though he knew how to be
prudent enough in the orders he gave to officers
at a distance, yet when he was in the saddle
directing affairs in person, and there came to be
a question between holding back and going for-
ward, his blood always used to get heated, and,
like his great master, he had so often been happy
in his choice of the time for running a venture,
that his spirit had never been cowed. Having
once begun to ride forward, he did not restrain
himself. And surely there was a great fascination
to draw him on. The ground was of such a kind
that, with every stride of his charger, a fresh
view was opened to him. For months and
months he had failed to tear off the veil which
hid from him the strength of the army he under-
took to assail ; and now suddenly, in the midst
of a battle, he found himself suffered to pass
forward between the enemy's centre and his left
wing. As at Badajoz, in old times, he had
galloped alone to the drawbridge and obtained
the surrender of St Christoval, so now, driven
by the same hot blood, he joyously rode without
troops into the heart of the enemy's position; and
Fortune, still enamoured of his boldness, was
awaiting him with her radiant smile; for the
, path he took led winding up by a way — rather
steep and rough here and there, but — easy enough
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 171
for saddle - horses ; and presently in the front, c HA P.
but some way of!' towards the left, he saw before '. —
him a high commanding knoll, and, strange to
say, there seemed to be no Russians near it. In-
stantly, and before he reached the high ground,
he saw the prize and divined its worth. He was
swift to seize it. Without stopping — nay, even,
one almost may say, without breaking the stride
of his horse — he turned to General Airey, wdio
rode close at his side, and ordered him to bring up
Adams's brigade with all possible speed. Then,
still pressing on and on, the foremost rider of the
Allied armies, he gained the summit of the knoll.
I know of no battle in which, whilst the forces Lord Rag-
lan s posi-
of his adversary were still upon their ground, and «on on the
still unbroken, a general has had the fortune to
stand upon a spot so commanding as that which
Lord Eaglan now found on the summit of the
knoll. The truth is, that the Russian commander
had not troops enough to occupy the whole po-
sition, and the part he neglected was, happily,
that very one into which Lord Raglan had ridden.
During the earlier part of the day a battalion had
been posted in the ravine close under the knoll ;
but, in an evil hour for the Czar, the battalion
had been removed,* and, the enemy having no
other troops in the immediate neighbourhood, and
having no guns in battery which commanded the
summit of the knoll, the English General, though
as yet he had no troops with him, stood un-
molested in the heart of the enemy's position —
* The No. 1 Taroutine battalion.— C/tot/asiewicz.
172 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, stood between that wing of the Kussian army
^ which confronted the French, and that doubly
large portion of it which confronted the English
The knoll was not, indeed, so situated as to com-
mand a distant view towards our right ; but,
glancing to his left, or, in other words, glancing
eastward and up the valley of the river. Lord
Eaglan saw in profile his own line of battle, but
also (rare fortune !) he equally saw in profile the
whole of that line of battle which the Prussians
opposed to his troops. Nor was even this all;
for upon turning his eyes towards the rear of the
enemy's Causeway batteries, he saw what then
constituted the whole of Prince Mentschikoff's
' Great Eeserve ' — that is, a force of infantry drawn
up in two heavy columns.*
The formation of each mass looked close and
perfect as though it had been made of marble, and
cut by rule and plomb-line. These troops being
liekl in reserve, were, of course, on ground much
less advanced than the front of the Piussian array;
but they were only 900 yards from the eye of
the English General; for it was Lord Eaglan's
strange and happy destiny to have ridden through
*The three 'Minsk' battalions had been withdrawn, as we
saw, from tlie ' Great Reserve ; ' and accordingly, if the Russian
accounts be accurate, the two columns mentioned in the text
must have included only the four 'Volhynia' battalions. It
was certainly, I believe, the impression of our oflicers that each
column had a .strength of four battalions ; but without trusting
blindly to the official accounts of the Russians, I am neverthe-
less unwilling to cast myself loose from the guidance they offer
me so far as concerns the presence or absence of particular
regiments.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 173
a gap left in the enemy's line of battle till he had chap.
approached thus closely to the very rearmost of !
Prince MentschikoffB forces.
Russian Reserves. Lj 'bb a
y Causeway
-Td
, , batteries, a^
^ ^~^ + — + ^ D 0 O
Bulk, of Russian Army.
English Army.
French Army.
All this — now told with labour of words — Lord
Eaglan saw at a glance, and at the same moment
he divined the fatal perturbation which would be
inflicted upon the enemy by the mere appearance
of our Headquarter Staff in this part of the field.
The knoll, though much lower than the summit
of the Telegraph Height, stood out bold and plain
above the Pass. It was clear that even from afar
the enemy would make out that it was crowned
by a group of plumed officers ; and, Lord Kaglan's
imagination being so true and so swift as to gift
him with the faculty of knowing how in given
circumstances other men must needs be thinking
and feeling, it hardly cost him a moment to infer
that this apparition of a few horsemen on the
spur of a hill was likely to govern the enemy's
fate. It would not, he thouglit, occur to any Pais- iiis instant
sian fjeneral that fifteen or twenty Staff officers, sionoftue
° -^ advantage
whetlier French or English, couki have reached gained:
the knoll without having thousands of troops close
for a couple
of guns
174 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, at hand. The enemy's generals would therefore
' infer that a large proportion of tlie Allied force
had won its way into the heart of the Eussian
position. This was the view which Lord Eaglan's
mind had seized when, at the very moment of
crowning the knoll, he looked I'ound and said,
' Our presence here will have the best effect.'*
Then, glancing down, as he spoke, into the flank
of the Causeway batteries, and carrying his eye
round to the enemy's infantry reserves. Lord
his appeal Haglan Said, 'Now, if we had a couple of guns
liere ! '*
His wish was instantly seized by Colonel Dick-
son f and Captain Adye, both of the Koyal Artil-
lery, and one or two other officers. Captain Adye
and one or two others rode off in all liaste.
The rest of the group which had followed Lord
Eaglan remained with him upon the summit of
the knoll ; and now facing eastward, and making
use of their field-glasses, they began to examine
the battle. There was much that awaited their
gaze; for the time when Lord Eaglan attained
this singular vantage-ground was a little anterior
to the moment when our troops, led by General
Codrington, sprang up as already narrated, to
crown the left bank of the river.
The Light Division had not then begun to
* I heard him say so, and say so immediately upon crowning
tlie knoll.
+ Colonel Dickson of the Artillery. It was the happy acci-
dent of his being with Lord Eaglan as chief of the staff of in-
terpreters which gave liim the opportunity of rendering the
aei'vices narrated iu the te.\t.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 175
emerge from the thick ground and the channel of chap.
the river ; but presently some small groups, and '
afterwards larf^er gatherino's of the red-coats, an- progress
° *= ° . , ' ^ of the battle
peared upon the top of the river's bank on the then going
, on under
Russian side, and at length — passing almost at ^is eyes.
right angles across Lord Eaglan's line of vision —
there went on before him that eager tumultuous
onset of the troops, led by Cod'rington, which we
long ago saw them maintaining until they had
seized the Redoubt.
Lord Raglan knew that the distance between
him and the scene of the struggle at the Redoubt
was too great to allow of his then tampering
with it ; for any order that he might send would
lose its worth in the journey, and tend to breed
confusion. And it was not in his way to assuage
his impatience by making impotent efforts ; nor
would he even give vent to his feeling by words
or looks disclosing vexation. He had so great a
power of preventing his animal spirits from droop-
ing, that no one could see in his glowing counten-
ance the faintest reflection of the sight which his
eyes took in. His manner all the time was the
manner of a man enlivened by the progress of a
great undertaking without being robbed of his
leisure. He spoke to me, I remember, about
his horse. He seemed like a man who had a
clue of his own, and knew his way through the
battle.
Watching the onslaught of Coclrington's brigade,
Lord Raglan had seen the men ascend the slope
and rush up over the parapet of the Great Re-
176 WATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, doubt. Then moments, then whole minutes —
^' precious minutes — elapsed, and he had to bear
the anguish of finding that the ground where he
longed to see the supports marching up was still
left bare. Then — a too sure result of that de-
fault— he had to see our soldiery relinquishing
their capture and retreating in clusters down the
hill.
A Frcnci. Morcover, at that moment affairs were going ill
^inpo'n with the French. The appearance of our Head-
quarters on the knoll had been marked by our
Allies as well as by the enemy ; for now a French
aide-de-camp, in great haste, came climbing up
the knoll to seek Lord Raglan. He seemed to
be in a state of grievous excitement ; but perhaps
it was the violence of his bodily exertion which
gave him this appearance, for he had quitted his
horse in order the better to mount the steep, and
lie rushed up bareheaded to Lord Eaglan, but so
breathless from his exertions that for a moment
he could hardly articulate ; and when he spoke,
he spoke panting. He persisted in remaining
Hi8 mission, uucovcred. What he came to ask was that Lord
Itaglan would give some support to the French ;
and, as a ground for the demand, he urged that
the French were hardly pressed by the enemy
' My Lord,' he said — ' my Lord, my Lord, we have
' before us eight battalions ! ' * One could see, or
imagine that one saw, what was passing in Lord
Raglan's mind. He was pained by thinking that,
* '^ililonl, iiiilorJ, iious avons devaiit nous huit bataillons.'
1 heard liiia say those words.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 177
either from mental excitement or from the viol- CHAP,
euce of his bodily exertion, the officer should seem '
discomposed ; but what tormented him most was lo>(1 Rag-
■^ . lan's way
the sight of the young man standing bareheaded, withh-iL
for to tell him to be covered would be to assume
that the bared head was an obeisance meant to
be rendered to himself Bending in his saddle,
Lord Eaglan turned kindly round towards his
right — towards the side of his maimed arm — and
his expression was that of one intent to assuage
another's pain, but the sunshine of the last two
days had tanned him so crimson that it masked
the generous flush which used to come to his face
in such moments. He did not look at all like an
anxious and vexed commander who had to listen
to a desponding message in the midst of a battle.
He was rather the courteous, lively host enter-
taining a shy, youthful visitor, and trying to place
him at his ease. In his comforting, cheerful way,
he said, ' I can spare you a battalion.' * But it
was something of more worth than the promise
of a battalion that the aide-de-camp carried back
with him. He carried back tidings of the spirit
in which Lord Eaglan was conducting the battle.
At the time when the French were cast down, it
was of some moment to them to learn that the
* ' Je puis vous douner un bataillon.' I heard Lord Eaglau
make that answer. Lord Raglan, I imagine, meant to fulfil
the promise by detaching one of the two battalions about to
arrive under Adams ; but by the time that force came up the
course of events rendered it unnecessary to send the promised
aid. However, Sir Eichard England afterwards moved into
the close neighbourhood of Prince Napoleon's Division.
VOL. HL M
178
BATTl.H OF THE ALMA.
CHAP.
I.
Causes of
the depres-
sion which
had come
upon llie
French.
Operations
on the
Telegraph
Heiglit.
English Head(iuarters, strangely placed as they
were in the midst of the Russian position, were a
scene of robust animation, and that Lord Itaglan
looked and spoke like a man Avho had the foe in
his power.
XXVI.
It is now time to speak of events which had
been bringing the French army into a state of
increased depression. We saw that General
Kiriakoff, commanding the Paissian left wing, had
charge of the Telegraph Height, and confronted
the Divisions of Prince Napoleon and Canrobert,
having also on his left and left front, though at
greater distances, the two separated brigades of
Bosquet's Division, and the five battalions of
Turks. The infantry force remaining under Kiria-
koffs orders had been reduced, by Prince Ment-
schikoff's abstraction of the ' Moscow ' troops, to
a force of only nine battalions ; and afterwards,
when the second ' Moscow ' battalion rejoined the
rest of the corps, the infantry force remaining
under Kiriakoff consisted only of the four * Tar-
' outine ' and the four ' Militia ' battalions. The
part which these ' Taroutine ' and ' Militia ' bat-
talions had been taking in the battle may be told
in a summary w^ay. They did not attack the
French, and were not themselves attacked by any
French infantry; but, because kept massed in
battalion columns, upon slopes which faced towards
their adversaries, they were exposed to a good
deal of artillery-fire at long range, and were from
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 179
time to time forced to shift their ground. The chap.
'Militia' battalions were troops of inferior quality; [ — .
and finding at last that, wherever they stood, they
were more or less galled by artillery, they dis-
solved* So, although he was supported by Prince
Mentschikoff in person, with 'the column of the
' eight battalions,' of which we shall presently
speak, yet in his own hands Kiriakoff had only
four battalions of sound infantry with which to
show a countenance to thirty thousand French-
men and Turks. But on the other hand, both of
Bosquet's brigades were distant. General Can-
robert, indeed, had so spread out his battalions on
the verge of the plateau, as to have them in readi-
ness for an encounter, so soon as his guns should
come up ; and having somewhat brought round
his riglit shoulder, he fronted towards the Tele-
graph, but, because still without his artillery, he
was hanging back in expectancy on the steep
broken ground close below the smooth cap of the
hill.
Prince Napoleon's Division at this time was in Backward-
. iiess of the
the bottom of the valley close to the river ; and, 3d French
. iJivisiou.
indeed, of the whole force which the Prince at
this time had around him, there were only two
battalions which had hitherto forded the stream. f
To the hopes which the French army had of being
* Chodasiewicz.
+ The battalion of the 19th Chasseurs, and one of the
battalions of the Marine Corps. The 2d Zouave Eegi-
ment had also crossed, but this, it will jjresently be seen,
was not a part of the force which Prince Napoleon 'ha*'
^ around him.'
180 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. alDle to take a great part in the action, this
' backwardness of one of their finest divisions
was almost ruinous ; and it is natural enougli that
a divisional general, whose rank gave him shelter
from the ordeal of a fair military investigation,
should for that very reason be made to suffer the
more bitterly from the stings which men robbed
of their freedom are accustomed to plant with the
tongue.
Pmice Eesembling the first French Emperor in out-
ward looks, Prince Napoleon was also very like
his uncle, not apparently in his main objects, but
in the character of his intellect ; for he had that
rare and exceeding clearness of view wldch man
is able to command when he can separate things
essential from things of circumstance, and keep
the two sets of thoughts so clean asunder as to-
be able to go to the solution of his main problem
with a mind unclouded by details — unclouded by
even those details which it is vital for him to
master and provide for, though he refuses to let
them mix with the elements from which lie
fetches out his conclusion. And although one
cannot help knowing that the most cruel of all
the imputations which can be brought against a
soldier has long been kept fastened upon Prince
Napoleou, I may say that the knowledge of his
peculiar career which I have hitherto chanced to
gain is far from being such as to warrant a denial
of his personal courage.
Tilt; ini.siiap.s Bcfovc the delinquency of the 3d French Divi-
hiin. sion on the day of the Alma is accepted as one
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 181
of the grounds which entitle the world to ratify chap
its harsh judgment against Prince Napoleon, men '_
ought in all fairness to know the mishap which
befell the Division, and to understand the con-
siderations which rendered this same mishap a
much more grave evil than it might seem to be
at first sight.
The French are so military a people that, when The mate-
a great national sentiment is once aroused, the which the
, ., , , . , . , . , hulk of
very children are ready to seize their little mus- tiie French
kets and fall into columns of companies ; but in taken,
the mean time, and until the mighty nation is
challenged, the great bulk of the French peas-
antry are perhaps more homely, more rustic,
more unadventurous than most of the people of
Europe. From these quiet millions of people,
many tens of thousands of small, sad, harmless-
looking young men are every year torn by the
conscription ; and immense energy — energy in-
formed with the traditions of an ancient and ever
warlike nation — is brought to bear upon the
object of turning these forlorn young captives
into able soldiers. All that instruction can
achieve is carefully done ; but the enforced
change from rural life to the life of barracks and
camps seems not to be favourable to the animal
spirits of tlie men : for although, when seen in
masses or groups working hard at their mili-
tary duties, they always appear to be brisk, and
almost merry, their seeming animation is the
result of smart orders — the animation of a horse
when the rowels on either side are lightly touch-
182 BATTLE OF THE ALMA,
CHAP, ing his flanks ; and during the hours whilst they
^' are left to themselves, the French soldiers of the
line engaged in campaigning are commonly de-
pressed and spiritless.* Of course, this want of
lustiness in the French army is superby masked
by all the resources of military pomp, and all the
outward signs which seem to show the presence
of vigour, despatch, and warlike ardour ; but the
material of which the line regiments are com-
posed must always keep a good deal of its original
nature ; and whoever glances at the rising steps
of French officers successful in Africa will find
that they have climbed to eminence, not by lead-
ing troops of the line, but by obtaining, in the
critical part of their career, the command of
choice French regiments, or, failing that, the
The great Command of troops of foreign race.f These choice
betwee"n^ Freucli regiments are not composed of materials
reliments'^^ at all like those which supply the line : on the
oftheir contrary, they number in their ranks many thou-
'^°°^^' sands of bold, adventurous men who take service
in the army of their own accord ; and it is in
these choice regiments that France sees the true
expression of her warlike nature. Of all these
Each choice regiments the 'Zouaves' are the most
thwlfo^e, famous ; and each of the three foremost Divi-
with™"" sions of the French army on the Alma had in it a
other choice regiment — a regiment with its two war battalions
regim n . — belonging to the corps of the Zouaves. What
* I rest this iqioii what I have seen of the Freucli army in
Africa, in the Crimea, and on board sliip.
+ I.e., of the Foreign Legion, or of the native African levies.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 183
the spear-liead is to a spear, that its Zouave Eegi- chap.
ment was to each of these three Divisions.*
regiment.
Prince Napoleon's division comprised 9000 Prince
Najioleon i.";
men ; and of these, some 2000 were men of abandoned
the 2d Eegimeut of Zouaves. Whether this zouave
regiment was impatient of the supposed slow
ness with which Prince Napoleon had hitherto
advanced — whether it was governed by its con-
tempt of line regiments, and a fierce resolve to
have no neighbourship with any other than Zou-
ave comrades — or whether there were other causes
which shaped its movements, I have not learnt ;
but what happened was this : the regiment after
fording the river, broke away from the unfor-
tunate Division to which it belonged, marched off
towards its right front, began to climb the height,
and never stopped until it had coolly ranged itself
close alongside of the 1st Zouave Piegiment — a
regiment which formed the left of Canrobert's
array. With Canrobert's Division, instead of
with Prince Napoleon's, the regiment continued
to act until the close of the battle. Before men
are hard upon a divisional general for his seem-
ing backwardness in an action, they ought to
allow for the misfortune which left him indeed
the master of some 7000 men, but robbed him of
the warlike corps on which he must have relied
as the element for giving life and fire to his
* I have borrowed this expressive image from Lord Clyde,
who used it once iu conversation as a means of ilhistrating the
kind of power which even a large body of our native Indian
troops is accustomed to derive I'roai the presence of one or two
Eutilish battalions.
184 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, masses. For, if one might recur to the image
I o O
' already used, one would say that the spear-head
had flown off, and that what remained in the
hands of Prince Napoleon was only the wooden
shaft. Justice in this regard is the more needful,
since it would plainly be unfitting and impolitic
for Prince Napoleon to say in his defence, that
with 7000 Prench troops around him he was still
reduced to helplessness by the want of his Zouave
Eegiment.
Aisost There is another consideration which alone
wasriiiiug would sccm to frco Prince Napoleon from almost
with this
Division, all tlie blame founded upon the backwardness of
and lie
therefore his Divisiou. In the midst of that very Division,
was answer- '' '
able for its Marshal St Arnaud was all this time riding ; and
jilace in the ...
''«w- it is obvious that by being thus present with a
force which was hanging back out of its place, the
officer who commanded the whole Prench army
brought full upon his own shoulders the weight of
the blame which might otherwise be thrown upon
the divisional general.
irAnniiu's But the eloping of his Zouave liegiment was
thrusts not the only mishai) which befell Prince Na-
itself for- •' '■
ward in polcou. \Ve saw that D'Aurelle's brigade — a
a<lvanee ^
of Prince brigade forming part of the 4th or Pieserve Divi-
Napoleon ; ox
sion — had been ordered to support Canrobert. Of
the motives which governed the leader of this
brigade I know nothing, Perhaps, whilst he was
low down in the bottom of the valley, he lost
his conception of the distance (the lateral distance
from east to west) which separated him from the
Division he was ordered to support. At all
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 185
events, what he did was this: having his whole CHAP,
brigade iu a close, deep, narrow column, he '
pushed forward and jammed it into a steep road
exactly in front of Prince Napoleon's foremost
battalion. He thus made it impossible for Prince
Napoleon to get into action by that road,* and
put him in the plight of a man left behind — in
tlie plight of a general who commands one of the
Divisions intended to be foremost, and yet is left
planted with his force in the rear of troops meant
to act as reserves. Nor did D'Aurelle's brigade
do any tlie least good by thus thrusting itself in-
to the road in advance of Prince Napoleon ; for,
either because of the nature of the ground or from
some other cause, the brigade never spread itself
out so as to be capable of fighting. Always in
deep column with narrow front, it hung back but in an
clinging fast to the steep part of the hill, and "ncapaci-"'^
remaining unseen by Kiriakoff, who moved free- from any
ly across its front as though there were no such combat
force on the hill-side. Upon the whole, the re-
sult was, that, taken together, D'Aurelle's brigade
and Prince Napoleon's mutilated Division were
a column of near 12,000 men, which might be
said to be in mere order of march during all the
critical period of the battle ; for, with a depth of
nearly a mile, the column had a front of only a
few yards. Thus disposed, the 12,000 men who
formed the column were not, of course, in a state
which allowed of their attempting to engage an
* There was another road by which the Prince could, and hy
which at a later period he did, ascend.
186
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP.
L
Uelplessiiess
of tlie deep
column
which was
fonued by
D'Aurelle's
brigade and
Prince
Napoleon's
Division.
Condition
of Kiriakuff
on the
Telegrapli
HeiLdit.
enemy inclined to make a stand against tliem ;
and they were even, it would seem, very lielple.s3
for purposes of mere self-defence.* Indeed, it is
hard to see how they could have escaped a great
disaster, if a bold ilussian officer who knew the
ground had come down with a few score of light-
infantry men upon the flank of D'Aurelle's bri-
gade. Apparently Kiriakoff's abstinence from all
enterprises of this sort, and the quiet confidence
with which he afterwards manoeuvred on the pla-
teau, were both owing to the steepness of ground
which hindered him from perceiving the small
slender head of D'Aurelle's column.
Upon the whole, then, Kiriakoff, tliough hand-
ling no forces except his two batteries, his four
Taroutine battalions, and his fast-dissolving mili-
tiamen, was not at this time out of heart. His
artillery, sweeping down the smooth cap of the
Telegraph Height, both on its northern and north-
western sides, commanded the only ground by
which Canrobert could advance ; and, firing over
the heads of the Taroutine battalions, effectually
kept him down. Moreover, it still tormented all
those masses of French infantry which, though
approaching the Telegraph Heiglit, were not yet
so close as to have come in for the shelter which
tlie steepness of the hillside afibrded.
And now we shall see the cause of the stress
* See the ]>lan showing the way in wliich Prince Napoleon's
Division and D'Aurelle's brigade were disposed. It is taken
from the official French plan of the * Atlas de la Guerre
♦d'Orient.'
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 187
which had been put upon the French army by chap.
that incubus of the 'eight battalions' of which '
the aide-de-camp spoke. We left Prince Ment- The 'coiumi;
schikoff countermarching irom west to east with ' battalions
the seven battalions which he had under his
personal orders. The detached battalion of the
' Moscow ' corps had been afterwards called in,
and its junction brought up the whole body to
eight battalions. With this force gathered in
mass, and standing halted on tlie right rear of the
Telegraph, Prince Mentschikoff was preparing to
make an onslaught upon the head of Canrobert's
Division ; but just as he was going to move, he
abandoned the idea of leading the column in
person. The cause of this change is obvious.
Evidently Prince Mentschikoff was called off to
another part of the field by tidings of what the
EnjTlish were doing.
Kiriakoff had had a horse shot under him, and Kinakoff
was standing on foot near one of his ' Taroutine ' with the
clitir'-'6 of
battalions, when Prince Mentschikoff rode up, this column
and (apparently suppressing the tidings which
forced him to quit this part of the field) gave
Kiriakoff the charge of the great ' column of the
' eight battalions ' which had been amassed for
the purpose of an attack upon Canrobert's Divi-
sion. The Prince then rode off, and was not seen
again or heard of in this part of the field. Of
course it follows that he went as straight as he
could towards that part of his position which was
undergoing the assault of the English.*
* I say ' it follows,' because Prince Mentschikoff was u i)rave
188
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP.
I.
He marches
it across the
liotlt of
D'Aurcllo's
nri'M'l'' ;
Kiriakoff instantly took a fresh horse and rode
to the frround — "round on the right rear of the
Telegraph — where the 'column of the eight bat-
' talions * awaited him. This vast column he dis-
posed in a solid body, with a front of two, and a
depth of four massed battalions. When all was
ready, he began to move it flankwise from east to
I I
I I
west. Plainly hindered by the ground from see-
ing the head of the column which was formed by
D'Aurelle's brigade and Prince Napoleon's Divi-
sion, he dealt with the Prench as though they
had no such force near; for with that heavy
column of his, which trailed, as we have seen, to
a depth of four battalions, he marched straight
across the front of D'Aurelle's brigade. He
marched in peace. Nay, so far were the Prench
from looking upon his hazardous movement in
the light of a gift offered them by Fortune, that
it was the dread apparition of this vast Russian
column which had sent the panting aide-de-camp
to the side of Lord Raglan's stirrup.
man, incapable of quitting one of the two scenes of battle ex-
cept for the purpose of going to the other. In the mention
which they make of Prince Meutschikoff's presence in did'erent
parts of the field, the narratives of the Russian divisional gen-
erals leave a chasm of several important minutes. This chasn;
aa will be seeu at a later page, I try to fill up by conjecture.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 189
Bendins afterwards more towards the novtli, chap.
. I
Kiriakoff advanced upon the right centre of the '.
ground on which Canrobert had spread his bat- |"vano"s
talions. Canrobert's troops did not long stand "j'g,',""'j^tre
their ground ; for when Kiriakoff, advancing and bert's'nTvi-
still advancing, was nearly at last within nnisket- ^'°"
shot of his foe, the French no longer bore up
under the weight that is laid upon the heart of
a Continental soldier by the approach of a great
column of infantry. Kiriakoff conceives that he
inflicted a sheer defeat upon his foe. ' Canrobert's
' Division,' he writes, ' could not resist our charge.
' Hastily taking off their batteries, they began to
' descend the hilly bank.' * On the other hand,
the French say nothing of this reverse. Per-
haps the truth lies intermediately between the
broad assertion of Kiriakoff and the unfaithful
silence of the French ; for what seems the most
likely is, that Canrobert, being still without his
artillery, was for the moment resolved to decline
the combat, and that with that view, and of his own
free will, without waiting to be put under stress of
actual fight, he drew his troops down to a steeper
part of the hillside. Be this as it may, it is certain The head of
. Canrobert'g
that, under the pressure of Kiriakon s great colunni. Division
-r^- • • p 11 1 1 I faUsback.
the head of Canrobert s Division fell back.-f-
* Kiriakoff's narrative. It will be observed that his state-
ment clashes with the passage in which I say that Canrobert
was without his guns. I have relied upon the detailed state-
ments supplied to me from French sources ; and it' I am right
in doing so, it follows that Kiriakoff must have been mistaken
in sui)posing that he saw the French carrying olf their guns.
t Upon tliis point Kiriakotf's narrative is confirmed by
190 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. Along almost their whole array at this time it
_i seemed to fare ill with the Allies. Still close
batup.'aV"' ^° '^^ sea-shore, Bouat, with one French brigade
this time. j^n(j 5000 Turks, was without artillery, and was
therefore holding back from the plateau, far away
from any scene of strife. Following the same
barren track. General Forey with Lourmel's
brigade was marching to tlie sea-shore, and was
annulled. Bosquet, with his one brigade on the
plateau, had long been isolated, and was not so
near to any llussian battalion as to be able to
engage it with his infantry. Canrobert was
undergoing the check M'hich we have just seen.
The unwieldly column formed by D'Aurelle's
brigade aiird by Piince Napoleon's Division — a
column with a front of only a few yards and the
depth of a mile — was in an order adapted for the
march, but not for fighting, and, its small slender
crest being kept close down out of sight, had
failed to exert that pressure which, even without
firing a shot, may be inflicted by the known
presence of a great body of troops. And the
forces thus palsied were nothing less than the
whole French army, including even their reserves.
Much, of course, might always be hoped from the
bravery and the swift invention of the warlike
French ; but apart from that vast though unde-
fined resource, and apart from what fortune might
do for him, Marshal St Arnaud was without the
Roniaiiin. "Writing from liis saddle, and at the verj' minute of
witnessing the event, he recorded it in these words : ' French
* centre falling back.' — Koinaine's saddle-notes.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 191
means which would enable him to bear up against chap.
any grave disaster, and hinder it from becoming _____
sheer ruin.
The fortunes of the English had been checkered ;
and it might be said that at this moment their
prospects were a good deal overcast. Evans, still
repressed by the commanding fire of the Causeway
batteries, and having but three battalions to fight
with, was sustaining a hard conflict, Codrington's
people had been forced to relinquish their hold of
the Great Eedoubt ; and the shattered remains of
the battalions which stormed the work were not
only descending the slope of the hill, but (as will
be afterwards seen more particularly) breaking
down by their bodily weight the left wing of a
battalion of Guards. Finally, General Buller, on
our extreme left, was in an attitude of mere de-
fence. It is true that the Great Eedoubt had
been dismantled — that (with the exception of the
centre battalion of the Guards) our supports had
not yet tried their prowess — and that the bare
apparition of our Headquarter Staff on the knoll
was putting a heavy stress on the enemy. It is
true, also, that there was one English regiment
still fighting with a Eussian column. All else
had of late gone ill.
XXVII.
This was the condition of things when Lord
Eaglan's sudden, vehement longing for ' a couple
' of guns' received its happy fulfilment. Captain
192
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
C 11 A P.
].
The two
f;uiis which
Lord Raghm
had called
(or aie
brought to
the to]) of
tlie knoll.
Their tire
enfilades
the Cause-
way bat-
teries, and
e;iuses the
enemy to
withdraw
uis guns.
Adye, upon hearing the commander's words, had
galloped down to the river, and there had i'ound
Turner's battery making its way across the ford.
Adye's manner and words carried with them, if so
one may speak, the exceeding eagerness of Lord
llaglan ; and, the commander of the battery (Cap-
tain Turner) being a determined and most able
officer, two of his guns were dragged up to the
top of the knoll witli extraordinary despatch.
Captain Turner came up in person wath the part
of his battery thus hurried forward. The two
pieces, when once on the top, were soon un-
limbered ; and one of them — for the artillerymen
had not all been able to keep pace — was worked
by Colonel Dickson with his own hands. The
o-uns were pointed upon the flank of the Cause-
way batteries. Every one watched keenly for the
result of the first shot. The first shot failed.
Some one said, ' Allow a little more for the wind ; '
and the words were not spoken as though they
were a ciuotation from ' Ivanhoe,' but rather in a
way showing that the speaker knew something of
artillery practice.* The next shot, or the next
shot but one, took effect upon the Causeway bat-
teries. It struck — so men said — a tumbril drawn
up close in rear of the guns.
It presently became a joyful certainty that the
Causeway batteries, exposing their flank to this
* I might well say the words sounded as though comiug
from one who 'knew something of artillery practice,' for, as I
now know, the speaker was Captain, now Colonel, Turner him-
self, the officer commanding the battery
BATTLE 01' Tin: ALMA. 193
fire from the knoll, could not hold their ground; ciiAP.
and in a few moments a keen-eyed officer, who .;
was one of the group around Lord Eaglan, cried
out Avith great joy, ' He is carrying off his guns !'
And this was true. The field-pieces which formed
the Causeway batteries were rapidly limbered
up and dragged to another ground far up in the
rear.*
With the two great columns of iniantiy which it ploughs
constituted the enemy's reserves it fared no better, eneiuy's
reserves
After not more than two failures, the L,ainner and diivM
. . "^ them from
got their range, and our nine-pounders ploughed thefieia.
through the serried masses of the two Eussian
columns, cutting Lines through and tlirough them.
Yet for some minutes the masses stood firm ; and
even when the still increasinij havoc at lencrth
o o
overruled the punctilio of those brave men, it
seemed to be in obedience to orders, and not
under the stress of any confusing terror, that the
two great columns gave way. They retreated in
good order.
Our gunners then tried their pieces upon the
Vladimir battalions, and although the range was
too great to allow of their striking the column,
they impressed Kvetzinski with a contrary belief.
He was sure that these troops were reached by
the guns on the knoll; and it will l)e seen by-and-
* Kiriakoff .sa^-s that these guns were dragged off bj' the men
of the Borodino coqis. I do not think that tliere were any
observers on ' Lord Uaglan's knoll ' who saw guns dragged
from the field by infantry ; but there were features in the
ground which prevented their seeing into the line of retreat as
efTectually as they had seen into the batteries.
VOL. III. N
194
i;attle of the alm.v.
Tlio Ouglitz
column was
Ktopped in
its advance
CHAP, by tliat llic belief lie tlius liavboui-cd was destined
^' to be one of the causes contributing to govern his
niovenienls.
This was the time when the great column of
the Ouglitz corps, being fired, as it seemed, with
a vehement spirit, was still marching down from
the higher slopes of the Kourgan^ Hill with a
mind to support the Vladimir battalions, and
enable them to press the retreat of our soldiery
then coming down in clusters from the Great
Itedoubt; but the disasters which Lord Raglan
had that moment inflicted upon the enemy by the
aid of the two guns on the knoll, made it natural
for the Russian Generals, who saw what was done,
to stop short in any forward movement. The
Ouglitz column, as we before saw, was stopped in
the midst of its eager advance ; and for want of
the support which these troops had been going
to lend, the triumphant Vladimir column was
brought to a halt on the site of the Great
Redoubt.
So here was the spell which now for several
minutes had been governing the battle. The
apparition of a score of plumed horsemen on this
knoll may have had more or less to do with the
resolve which led Kvetzinski to dismantle the
Great Redoubt: but, at all events, this apparition,
and the fire of Lord Raglan's two guns, had enforced
the withdrawal of the Causeway batteries; had
laid open the entrance of the Pass ; had shattered
the enemy's reserves; had stopped the onward
march of the Ouglitz battalions ; and had chained
So also
was the
Vladimir.
B.VTTLH OF Tlir: ALMA. 195
lip the lii;4ii-inGttled Vladimir in the midst of its chap.
triumphant advance.
I.
PrnRrcM
XXVIII.
On and near the great road leadincr down to tlie
bridge, Evans had been continuing liis difficult l^'illeS',y
struggle. He still shared with the flames the pos- ^^'""^"
session of the village — still held the vineyards
below it ; and a part of his small force had suc-
ceeded, as already shown, in crossing the river,
and establishing itself under the bank on the Rus-
sian side ; but beyond the ground thus gained,
Evans had not yet been able to push ; for the
Causeway batteries were so well placed, and so
diligently served, that they closed the movitli of
the Pass.
The force around Evans was scant, but in other
times he had commanded an army ; and whilst he
Avatched the efforts of the only three battalions
remaining near him, he was alive to the progress
of the action in other parts of the field.* lie had
just witnessed the onset of Codrington's brigade ;
and he was sitting in his saddle tormented with
the grief of observing that, for want of supports,
the storming of the Great Redoubt was likely to
be all in vain, when suddenly he heard the report
* The tlivee battalions iieai" him were the 47th (Adams's
brigade), and the 30th and tlie 55th, botli belonging to General
Pennefather's. The 95th, as we saw, was carried forward in
the rush of Codrington's brigade, and (with the exception of
tlie 47th Regiment) Evans's second brigade (the one commanded
by General Adams) was in another part of the field.
19G BATTLE OF TIIH ALMA.
CHAP, of a niiie-pouiider gun sounding I'lom a very now
" quarter — sounding from sonicwliere among llic
Giinsiirani kuolJs au.d brokeu ground on his right front, and
irsiniluliin; . , , /• i 7 1 • • ■ rni
irnin the in the heart oi the laissum })osition. ihe nre
knoll : 11-111 1 1 1 /-i
\vas repeated. Ji,vans keenly watched tlie Cause-
way batteries in his front. And not in vain, for
again the nine-poiuuhir was h.eard, and tliere fol-
thcirvisiiiio ](j\vcd tluit sort of chaiige in the liussian batteries
('(reel 11111)11 "^ -in
the Cause- wliich seciiicd to show that they were under fire
wr.y bat- . . "^
teiies. — under fire coming llankwise from llie west.
Again and again the lire of the nine-pouiuler was
r(.'peaied. The sound came from a quarter to
which it was to be ex])octed that the French might
liave reached ; l)ut some, they say, fancied and
said, 'That is an English gun!' AVhoever so
spake liad an ear for the music of battle, the nine-
pounder thus heard being one of the two that
Lord llaglan had brought up to the knoll. A busy
change began to stir in the liussian batteries. Pre-
sently, though the smoke of tlie burning village
lay heavy in this part of the field, our people could
make out what the change M'as. Tt was one of
•jreat moment to the Allies ; for the cnemv
was limbering up, and l)eginning to cany off
tlie sixteen guns whi(;]i up to this minute had
barred the mouth of the Pass. The great road
lay open.
Kvaii»a-i- Evans understood the battle, lie acted iu-
i-ineiiig.
stantl^^ He saw that though he was weak, yet
the moment had come for the advance of his three
battalions.
The 47th Pegiment under Colonel llaly had to
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 197
fovd the river below the bridge,* and at a ]Kut chap.
where tlie water was deep. It encountered a good ^"
deal of difficulty in crossing. Some men were Advance
drowned, but the rest gained the bank on the
Russian side of the stream and moved forward.
Evans rode across the stream at a point between
the 47tli and the two battalions of Pennefather's
brigade.
With tliese two battalions (the 30th and the ofthesoth:
55th regiments) General Pennefather was present
in person. Colonel Hoey, commanding the SOtli,
needed no order to advance. Understanding the
business of war, he had already gained a lodg-
ment for his battalion under the farther bank of
the river, and was plying the Eussian artillery-
men witli ritle fire when he observed that the
enemy's batteries suddenly slackened their fire.
He inferred the change that was coming ; and at
once caused his men to spring up the bank,
formed them carefully on the top, and then, hav-
ing his battalion in a beautiful line, marched
straight up towards the site of the Causeway
batteries.
When the 55th was approaching the Alma, ofuiesotii.
General Pennefather had desired that the battalion
should advance in line ; but after forming two or
three groups which were immediately struck down
by the enemy's shot, he allowed its commander
* The encniy seems to have imagined that liis sappers ami
miners (who had been posted near for the purpose) had cftVctu-
ally destroyed the bridge ; luit this was an error. When our
people obtained the dominion of it, they found the parajiet
wanting, but the bridge itself sound.
198
BATTLH OF TlIK ALMA.
C H A V.
I.
The ent'iiiy
does iiul
further
resist tliis
aclviin(;«
with his
infantry.
Evans,
joined liy
Sir Ricliard
England in
person, now
lias witli
himtliirty
guns.
(Uoluiiul Wari'c'ii) to lolluw u more sunimary
iiietliod. Colonel WiUTeu instantly crossed the
river, and formed the battalion in line under cover
of a S[mr or risiii^Lj-yround at the base of the hills.
When the line had been formed, it moved forward,
General Pennefather leading in front. At that
time the line of tlie 55th was parallel with the
river.
From first to last the enemy, so far as I know,
had done but little with the formed battalions of
his Borodino regiment disposed in this ])art of
the field ; * and he now began to draw in the
multitude of skirmishers which had hitherto
swarmed in the valley. "f" He did not engage his
iufautry in further endeavours to bar the mouth
of the Pass, nor even show one of his Ijatt aliens in
this part of the great road ; but upon the hillocks,
a good way in rear of the ground just abandoned
by the Causeway batteries, he again established
his guns ; and from this new position, though
not with great effect, he opened fire upon our
advancing troops.
To this fire General Evans was presently able
to reply with a strong force of artillery ; for Sir
Pilchard England rode up, proposed to accompany
him in the advance, and offered to place both his
batteries at Evans's disposal So the two divi-
* General Kiriakoll" says, as we have already mentioned, tliat
lliu Borodino battalions dragged away the guns of the Cause-
way batteries, but I cannot find any other distinct statement of
tilings done by the regiment in the course dI" the battle.
t Skirmishers drawn partly from tlie four Horodino battalions,
and partly also from the No. 6 Rifle battalion.
RATTLE 0]? TUK ALMA. 190
sional generals now rode forward together, having c H a P
with them in all thirty iiuns.* '
^ O ■
Moreover, the infantry of Sir Richard England's
Division was following him into the Pass, and
would soon bring a welcome support to Evans's
three battalions.-f*
But some minutes elapsed before these supports sii- uicimrd
could come up ; and, by reason of what had be- dispositions
/. 11 IT 1 T7- \ TT-11 1 for briiigins;
lallen our soldiery on the Kour2;ane Hill, the support to
. Evans.
three battalions which Evans had with him
were for some time almost alone upon the
enemy's ground. Yet not utterly ; for, on the
western slope of the Kourgane Hill, one English
battalion — Lacy Yea, with his Royal Fusiliers —
was still holding its ground, still engaged with
* i.e., the three batteries belonging respectively to the 1st,
the 2d, and the Light Divisions, and two belonging to the 3d,
Sir Richard England's Division.
+ Apparently Sir Richard England did not know of what had
befallen the Scots Fusilier Guards in time to be able to adapt
Ills measures to that event. Of course, if he had known it in
time, he would have been anxious to put a literal interpreta-
tion upon the order 'to support the Guards,' and would have
moved a part of his force towards the cliasm which had been
wrought in the centre of the brigade of Guards. I took pains
to make out the exact movements of the 3d Division, but in
vain ; for those who would be the most likely to know difier
broadly the one from the other. By further trouble I might
have dispelled this obscurity ; but the Division was not engaged
to an extent greater than might be inferred from its losses (one
killed and seventeen wounded), and therefore 1 have desisted
from further endeavours. It may be safely said, however, that
after receiving the order to support the Guards, Sir Richard
lingland held his Division in hand, sending portions of it to
give support where he deemed it to be needed ; and that when
Pennefather's brigade crossed the river it was followed by the
whole or bv the bulk of the 3d Division.
200
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
C II A I'
I.
Evans's
situation
iu the
u.can time
a mass of the enemy's infantry. That stand that
Lacy Yea had been making was a liingc on which
a gocxl deal might turn. If he should hold his
ground a few minutes more, he would cover from
the enemy's masses the left ihink and left front
of Evans's three battalions, and at the end of
that time the supports would be up. Evans was
an old commander, who knew how to read the
signs of a battle, and he was able to see and
understand that the enemy, almost iu the very
moment of his success at the Great IJedoubt,
was palsied by the guns still sounding from tlio
knoll, and was losing his freedom of action, lie
resolved to stand firm in the Pass ; and he
established his thirty guns near the site of the
l)atteries which had just been withdrawn by
the Piussians. For some minutes, his position
was rather critical ; and he had to trust much to
the hope that Lacy Yea and his Fusiliers would
be able to hold their OTound.
Pi-otractcd
fight be-
tween the
Royal
FusiViers
and the
left Kazan
colunm.
XXIX.
It was between the Great Causeway and the
slopes of the Kourgan6 Hill that Lacy Yea, with
his Royal Fusiliers, had long been maintaining
an obstinate conflict. Long ago, as we saw, he
had crossed the river, liad brought his men to
the top of the bank, and was trying to form them,
when there came down marching upon him a
strong Russian column — a column of two bat-
talions, and numbering some loOO men. These
15ATTLF, OF THE ALMA. 201
battalions belonged to the Kazan regiment — a cilAP.
corps which loyal Paissians had patience to call '
'the llegiinent of the Grand Duke ]\Iicliael.'
After having marched down some way, the
column came to a halt.
It was then that, for the first time in that war,
the soldiery of the Western Powers were bronght
so near to a body of Piussian troops as to be able
to scrutinise its material. The men of the column
were of high stature and strictly upright, with
broad, plain, whitish faces, all seemingly cast in
a common mould, and very similar the one to the
other. The long grey over- coat, worn alike by
all the officers and men of the Eussian forces,
and reaching down to the ankles, gave no clue to
distinguish this mass from any other of the Czar's
battalions ; but spiked helmets, glittering with
burnished plates of brass, led some of the English
to imagine that the column formed part of the
Emperor's guard* The body was formed with
great precision in close column, with a front of
only one company ; but a chain of skirmishers
thrown out on either flank in prolongation of the
front rank, sought to combine with the solid
formation of the column some of the advantages
of an array in line. 7 The steady men were in
* The notion was altogether ill-founded, there being none of
the Imperial Guard in the Crimea.
+ The advantages of this hybrid formation were strongly
urged about the middle of the last century by General Lloyd,
an Englishman. General Lloyd was an officer in the service of
Rus.sia, and it seems probable that the formation, of which he
was a vehement advocate, may have teen adopted in the Russian
service in consequence of his advice.
202 BATTLE OF TIIK AI.MA.
CHAP, tlie front and on llie iUuiks of the column; and
• the constant firing in tlie air whicli went on in
the interior of the mass showed that that was the
place assigned to the young soldiers. The column
stood halted at a distance of, perhaps, some fifty
yards from the knotted chain of soldiery which
represented the lioyal Fusiliers.
Lacy Yea was so rough an enforcer of discipline
that he had never been much liked in peace-time
by those who had to obey him ; ])ut wlien once
tlie Fusiliers were in campaign, and still more
when they came to be engaged with the enemy,
they found that their chief was a man who could
and would seize for his regiment all such chances
of welfare and glory as might come with the
fortune of war. They were destined to learn
before many months should pass over that,
although other regiments might be dying of
want, yet, by force of their Colonel's strong
will, there was food and warmth to be got for
the Pioyal Fusiliers ; and already they well under-
stood that the fiery nature of their chief was
a quality good in battle. The martinet of the
barrack-yard was in war-time a trusted ruler — a
king beloved by his people.
Lacy Tea had not time to put his Fusiliers in
their wonted array, for the enemy's column was
so near that, forthwith and at the instant, it was
necessary to ply it with fire ; but what man could
do, he did. His very shoulders so laboured and
strove with the might of his desire to form line,
that the curt red shell-jacket he wore was as
BATTLH OF THE ALMA. 203
though it were a workl too scant for tlie strength chap.
of the man and the passion that raged within '_^
him ; but wlien he turned, his dark eyes yiehled
lire, and all the while from his deep-chiselled,
merciless lips, there pealed the thunder of im-
precation and command. "Wherever the men had
got clustered together, there, fiercely coming, he
Avedged his cob into the tliick of the crowd — the
'rooge' he would call it, in his old Eton idiom
of speech — and by dint of ^vill tore it asunder.
Though he could nut form an even array, yet he
disentangled the thickest clusters of the soldiery,
and forced the men to open out into a lengthened
chain, approaching to line formation. Numbers
of the Fusiliers were wanting, and, on the other
hand, there were mingled with the battalion many
of the soldiery of other regiments. With a force
in this state, Yea was not in a condition to attempt
a charge or any other combined movement. All
he could hope to be able to do was to keep his
people firm on their ground, to hinder them from
contracting their front or gathering into heavy
clusters, and then leave every man to make the
best use he could of his riile.
Continental generals would not easily believe
that, upon fair, open ground, there could be a
doubtful conflict between, on the one side, a body
of fifteen hundred brave, steady, disciplined sol-
diers, superbly massed in close column, and on
the other a loose knotted chain of six or seven
hundred light-infantry men without formation.
Yet the fight was not so uner[ual as it seemed.
204: BATTLE OF Till: ALMA.
CHAP. A close c<)lmiin of iniantiy lias only small means
^' of offence, and is itself a thing so easy to hurt
that every volley it receives from steady troops
must load it with corpses and wounded men.
Tested strictly in that way — tested strictly by its
small means of hurting people, and the case with
which it can be hurt — the close column is a weak
thing to iight with ; and yet it has power over
the troops of most nations, because its grandeur
well fits it for weighing u])un the imaginations of
men.
But Lacy Yea and his islanders were not so
fashioned by nature, nor so tamed down by much
learning, as to be liable to be easily coerced in
any subtle, metaphysical way ; aiul although the
shots of individual soldiers and small knots of
men had not, of course, the crushing power which
would have been exerted by the lire of the Royal
Fusiliers when formed and drawn up in line, still,
tlie well-handled rifles of our men soon began to
carry havoc into the dark-grey oblong mass of
living beings wliich served them for their easy
target. And though, seemingly, the front rank
of the compact mass yearned to move forward,
there M'as always occurring in the interior some
sudden death or some trouble with a wounded
man, which seemed not only to breed difficulty
in the way of an advance, but also to make the
column here and there begin to look spotted and
faulty. The distance was such as to allow of a
good deal of shooting at particular men. Once
Yea himself found that he was singled out to be
r.ATTLI-: OF THE AU!A. 205
killed, ami was covered by a musket or rifle ; Lut cii a p,
the marksman Avas so fastidious about Lis aim .
that, before lie touched the trigger, a quick-eyed
English corporal found tinre to intervene and save
his colonel's life, by shooting the careful Kussian
in the midst of his studies. 'Thank you, my
' man,' said Lacy Yea ; 'if I live through this you
' shall be a sergeant to-night.'
"Whilst this long fight went on, it sometimes
ha]ipcned that the fire and impatience of one or
other of the Fusiliers -would carry a man into
closer quarters with the column. Of those who
M-ere spurred by sudden impulses of this kind,
Monck was one. He sprang forward, they say,
from his place on the left of the Fusiliers, and.
saying, ' Come on, 8th company ! ' rushed up to
the enemy's massed battalions, ran his sword
through a man in the front rank, and struck
another with his fist. He was then shot dead
I)y a musket fired from the second rank of the
column. Personal enterprises of this kind were
incidents varying the tenor of the fight; but it
was by musket or rifle ball at the distance of some
fifty yards that the real strife between the two
corps was waged.
It was not always against the enemy that Lacy
Yea v.'as labouring. ]Ie came to know or imagine
that some of his Fusiliers had remained behind
in the valley finding base shelter. That this
.'should be, and that even for a few minutes this
should pass, was to him not tolerable ; and in the
fiercest heat of his strife with the column, one of
20G BATTLK OY TliH ALMA.
CH A r. his best officers was sent back that lie might turn
^- the drove out of their sheds, and force them to
come instantly into the presence of the enemy,
— into the presence, more terrible still, of their
raging colonel.
The fight lasted. AVhen Codrington's people
were scarce beginning their lush towards the fnce
of the Great I'edoubt, tlie lioyal Fusiliers— rudely
and hastily gathered, but contriving to hold to-
gether— were beginning this battle of their own.
When the storming battalions came down, the
regiment was fighting still. AVhen the despon-
dency of the French army was at its worst — •
when the head of Canrobert's Division was pushed
back down the hill by the 'column of the eight
'battalions' — when, along the whole line of the
Allies, there was no other regiment fighting —
Lacy Yea and Ins people were still at their work.
"When Evans, having crossed the river, was lead-
ing his three battalions to the site of the Cause-
way batteries, it was the battalion of the lioyal
Fusiliers that stood fighting alone on his left ;
and nearly at the ver}^ time when disastei befell
the centre of the brigade of Guards, Lacy Yea and
his Fusiliers were gathering at last the reward ot
their soldierly virtue.
For by this time death and wounds, making
cavities and comi)elling small changes in the great
living mass, had injured the symmetry of the
spruce Paissian column. As a piece of mechanism,
it was no longer what it had been when the fight
began, but the spirit of the brave and obedient
BATTLE OF Till". ALMA. 207
men who coiniioscd it was still liiuli. 1'lic co- chap.
liesion of the mass was not yet destroyed ; but it .
was endangered, and had come to depend very
much upon the personal exertions of officers.
Lacy Yea observed that every now and then,
when a part of the cohunn was becoming faulty,
a certain man, always on foot, but of vast tower-
ing stature, would stride quickly to the defec-
tive spot, and exert so great an ascendancy, that
steadiness and order seemed always to be restored
by his presence. The grey over-coat common to
all shrouded the rank of every Paissian officer ;
and since this man was not on horseback, there
was nothing to disclose his station in the corps
except the power he seemed to wield. What
its colonel was to the Eoyal Fusiliers, that the
big man seemed to be to the Eussiau column ;
and it was not, I think, without a kind of .sym-
pathy with him — it was not, one would believe,
without a manly reluctance — that Yea ordered
his people to shoot the tall man. lie did, how-
ever, so order ; and he was quickly obeyed. The
tall man dropped dead, and when he had fallen
there was no one who seemed to be the like of
liim in power.
The issue of this long fight of the Fusiliers was
growing to be a thing of so great moment, or else
the sight of it was become so beating, that Prince
Gortscliakoff now resolved to take part in it
bodily. So, deputing Colonel Issakoff, then act-
ing as his Chief of the Staff, to represent hiui
in his absence, he rode down to the column and
in flunk.
208 BATTLE OK THE ALMA.
cii A P. strove to lead it on to a charge with the bayonet.*
^' But he could do nothing ; for, because of the dis-
order already" beginning, and the loss of great
numbers of its officers, the heart was nearly out
of the column. 7 So, giving orders for the bat-
talions to keep up their fire, he rode away to his
right and left the column still engaged with Yea
and his Fusiliers.
The 55th When Prince Gortscliakuff had ridden off, the
tiicrohimn columu was assailcd by fresh adversaries. After
crossing the river, Colonel Warren, we saw, pressed
on with the 55th regiment extended in line, and
his men in that order were advancing np the
Pass when he saw on his left front the colunm
engaged with Lacy Yea's Fusiliers. Colonel War-
ren instantly caused his regiment to Itring for-
ward their right shoulders, and in fact to wheel
* Tliis statement is founded, as will be seen below, \ipon a
narrative written by Prince Gortscliakofi' himself ; but it inter-
ested me to hear, as I lately did from an ofTicer in the Royal
Fusiliers, a statement coinciding exactly (so far as it goes) with
the Prince's narrative. Sir Tlioraas Troubvidge, M'lio was the
Major commanding the right wing of the Fusiliers, told me
he remembered that after the fight between the column and
the Fusiliers had been going on a long time, he saw a horse-
man with some mounted followers— evidently, as he conceived,
a General and his stalF — ride down and join the column. — Xotc
to i(h Edition.
t What Prince GortschakofT says is this : ' I first rode to-
* wards the chasseurs' (meaning the Kazan troops), 'who were
• standing finn under a very lieavy fire, although losing a large
' amount of men. I first tried to lead them on (S, la baionette),
' but finding that they could not re-form immediately for a
' charge, and had lost nearly all their officers, I left them with
•orders to continue their feu de bataillons.' — Kote to 1st
Edition.
BATTLE OF TIIF ALMA. 209
tipoii their centre, very much as a company ciiAi'
wheels. This manceuvrc was performed under '_
fire from the colunni, and tlie change of front was
carried to the length of bringing the battalion
into a line almost perpendicular to the line of its
former front, and almost parallel with the flanks
of the Eussian column. AVhen the manceuvre was
complete, the 55th opened fire upon the Hank of
the Russian column.
Portions of the column — mainly those in the
centre and in the rear — became discomposed and
unsettled. Numbers of men moved a little one
way or another, and of these some looked as
though they stepped a pace backwards ; but no
man as yet turned round to face the rear. How-
ever, though the movement of each soldier taken
singly was trifling and insignificant, yet even that
little displacement of many men at the same time
v.'as shaking the structure. Plainly, the men must
be ceasing to feel that the column they stood in
was solid. The ranks wdiich had been straight
as arrows became bent and wavy.
The Russian officers well understood these
signs. With drawn swords, moving hither and
thither as actively as they could in their long,
grey, melancholy coats, they seemed to become
loud and vehement with their orders, tlieir en-
treaties, their threats. Presently their gestures
UTew violent, and more than one officer was seen
to go and seize a wavering soldier by the throat.
Put in vain ; for seemingly by some law of its
own nature, rather than under any new stress of
VOL. in. 0
210 BATTLE OF THE AUIA.
uiJAT. external force, the column begun to dissolve; llie
ll hard mass became fluid. It still cohered ; but
Avh;it liad been, as it were, tlie outlines of
a wall, were becoming like tlie outlines of a
cloud.
The 55th was about to deliver a lire which
seemed likely to ^jrove cruelly destructive, when
it received an order which is believed to have
come from General Pennefather personally — an
order to 'cease firing and charge.' Thereupon
the ofiicers went out in front and busied them-
selves in the ordained task of stopping the fire ;
but already their adversaries were giving way.
First a few, then more, then all, turned round.
Defeat of Moviug slowly at first and as though discontent
with its fate, the column began to fall back. It
retreated after some moments with a much in-
creased speed, and is believed on the whole to
have escaped great part of the slaughter that
might have been inflicted upon it, if the fire of
the 55th had not been stayed by the order to
cliarge.
The Eoyal Fusiliers bought this triumph with
blood. In killed and wounded the battalion lost
twelve officers and more than two hundred men.
]\Ionck, we before saw, was killed; and Hare,*
Watson, Fitzgerald, Hibbert, Hobson (the Adju-
tant), Tersse, Apple}ard, Coney, Crofton, Carpen-
ter, and Jones, were wounded. For some time
one of the colours of the regiment was missing,
but it did not at any time fall into the hands of
* ]Iiue ilicd of his wounds ;i few houvs iil'tcr the battle.
thf col iiiin
15ATiI-E OF THE ALMA. 211
tho enemy, aiul icniained safe in charge of sonic chap.
soldiers belonging to the JJoyal Welsh * '. —
A regimental officer engaged in a general action
cannot often at the time compute the relative
importance of the duty which he is performing ;
but on the morrow of the battle, or even perhaps
much later, he may learn that the fortune of
the day was hinging upon the conduct of his
single regiment. Lacy Yea vas a simple-hearted,
straight-going man, with a wholesome ardour for
fi^htina. and a great care f(jr tlic honour of his
regiment, but not looking I'ar beyond it. Around
him the battle had been flowing and ebbing.
With the watching of those changes he did not
much ve.x his mind — he hardly, perhaps, remark-
ed them, lie was too busy with the fight to be
able to contemplate the battle. Except when he
yearned to unearth the people wliom he believed
to be skulking, and to have them dragged before
him, he thought of nothing but tliat the corps he
commanded should stand fighting and fighting till
it got the victory. He went through with his re-
solve, and hardly knew at the time the full worth
of his constancy. He hardly knew that, whilst
he fought, the whole of the English front line —
first on his left hand and then on his right — had
been getting the support it grievously needed from
the tenacity of his 7th — the Pioyal — Fusiliers.f
* The colour, I bi'lievc, was found lying upon the ground,
but how that came to happen I do not know, and I liave not
thought it necessary to find out, because the colour was never
for a moment ' lost.'
t See Plan. When Codrington's people were storming the
212 BATTLK OF Till-: ALMA.
CHAP. It ^vas plainly right that the defeated coluran
• should he pressed in its retreat hy troops in a
state of formation ; and Yea, looking hack, per-
il is ceived that the Guards were now at hand. Trou-
tiVauiro. hridge went to the Grenadiers — saw one of its
cuium'u officers — told him of the defeat of the Ilussian
prcssci column, and of the condition of the Royal Fusi-
Grenadiei: liers — and asked whether it would not he well
that the Grenadiers should come up and clinch,
the defeat of the retiring column. Colonel Hood
was referred to, and he at once consented to do as
was proposed.
Sir George Brown — his grey so wounded that
men saw the blood from afar — now chanced to
ride to the part of the hillside where Troubridge
was passing. After telling him of the defeat of
the Russian column, and of the state of the lioyal
Fusiliers, Troubridge asked him whether the Fusi-
liers should go on, or allow the Guards to pass
them. *
Sir George said, ' Let the Guards go on. Col-
' lect your men, and afterwards resume the ad-
' vance.'
reiloubt, they vrure covered on their right by the fight which
Yea was there maintaining ; when they liad to fall back, it was
still that stand of the Fusiliers which covered their flank.
When Evans advanced with his three battalions, there was
nothing but the lioyal Fusiliers to cover his left. For some of
the proofs by wliieli I support my .statements respecting the
fight maintained by the Royal Fusiliers, see Appendi.\', No. III.
* At this time, and whilst he was still .speaking with Sir
George Brown, Troubridge observed the sight which will be
referred to in a future page, as fi.xing the order in which events
followed one anotlicr in different parts of the field.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 213
XXX.
After only retiring so far as to Le nearly abrea.st Cil A P.
of the Great EedouLt, the column defeated by Lacy '. —
Yea's Fusiliers was able to rally and again show a ulffteu in
iVont to the English ; * for it had on its right the ule'ilussiaa
great Vladimir column, which still stood halted ^'""^ '"""
near the parapet of the Great Eedovht. On the
rio-ht rear of tlie Vladimir men there was a double-
battalion column, formed out of the Kazan corps.f
On the right of that last column, but still further
held back, there was another double -battalion
column, formed of the Sousdal corps ; and next to
these, but much more in advance, and standing on
the extreme right of the whole of the Paissian
infantry, there were posted the two remaining bat-
talions of the Sousdal corps. Somewhere in this
part of the field, there were the two battalions of
sailors. As an immediate reserve, or rather as a
support for all these forces, the four Ouglitz bat-
talions were kept in hand on the higher slopes
of the Kourgan^ Hill, and were still, as before,
massed in column. At some distance on the ex-
treme right of the Iiussian position, the enemy's
cavalry stood posted as before, confronting from
afar, but never provoking, the horsemen of our
* After their defeat, the two battalions which composed the
column seem to have parted from one another. The two bodies
/uto which it resolved itself remained, bravely lingering on the
hillside, though, having lost most of their olliccr.s, they were
in a helpless condition.
t The column defeated by the 19th Regiment, and by some
of the men of the 23d.
214 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. Liglit brigade. After allowing for casualties, and
' especially fur the heavy losses sustained by the
column which engaged our 7th Fusiliers, it may
be conjectured that these liussian forces on tho
Kourgan^ Ilill amounted to some 15,000 men.
Except the Kazan battalions, none of these troops
had been hitherto engaged in hard fighting, for
the triumpliant Vladimir column had not yet en-
countered formed troops. Nearly all the Eussian
artillery had been taken away from the front,
and, except that there were five pieces of ord-
nance not yet withdrawn from the Lesser Re-
doubt, the enemy had no guns now remaining in
battery. The impending struggle was a fight —
a sheer fight — of infantry.
Advance aud At the momcut wlieu the troops which had
discomfiture
ot the Scots stormed the redoubt beuan to retreat, the 1st
Fusilier . . . ,
Guards. Divislou had not yet emerged from the cover
afforded by the river's bank ; but General Cod-
rington's message hurried the advance of the Scots
Fusilier Guards.* The battalion climbed up the
bank, formed line with a good deal of haste, and
began to move forward.
At this time, there were numbers of stragglers
of the Light Division standing about near the
* We saw tliat, at the time of pas.sing the river, the left-flank
company got parted from the re.st of tho battalion. Tliat separa-
tion lasted during tlie period of tlie struggle which followed ;
and when, therefore, in this Note I speak of the Scots Fusilier
Guards in general terms, it must he understood that I mean to
designate that body of seven companies whicli remained to-
gether, when the left-flank company liad got parted from the
rest of the battalion.
BATTLE or THE ALMA. 215
Lank of tlie river; but in front of the left centre cil ap,
of the Fusilier Guards there was a large disordered '
body (men chietiy, I believe, of the 23d and 95th
Kegimeiits), who had just let go their hold of the
redoubt. These men had faced about to the front,
and were firing in the direction of the great column
of the Vladimir corps then halted within the
I'cdoubt. The moment the heads of the Fusilier
Guards rose clear of the ground which till then
had been giving them shelter, the men found
themselves under a flight of the enemy's missiles,
and the higher they marched, the more they in-
curred the fire which seemed to be directed against
the light infantry men in their front, !^[any of
the Fusilier Guards were struck down. Still, their
onward movement was maintained.
Suddenly the parapet of the redoubt became
thickly lined with llussian soldiery ; and, in the
next instant, the fire of the enemy's musketry
came heavily pouring down into the confused
body of light-infantry men who had been hitherto
making a stand in front of the Fusilier Guards.
The crowd of light-infantry men which received
this fire gave way ; and in another instant, it Avas
coming down in a mass towards the left centre of
the Fusilier Guards. Perhaps the haste with
which the Fusilier Guards had been pushed for-
ward was one of the causes which hindered them
from meeting the emergency by a fitting man-
oeuvre. It does not appear that any step Avas
taken to make the battalion open out. So pres-
ently, the descending crowd came into bodily
216 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, contact Avitli the Fusilier Guards; and tliis so
' heavily, that the crowd broke through a great part
of the left wing of the advancing battalion. The
weight of the retreating throng at that one spot
was so great and so unwieldy, that a soldier of
the Scots Fusilier Guards was thrown, it is said,
to the ground with such ibrce as to break his
ri]>s.* The part of the Scots Fusilier Guards
which had tlius been thrust out of line by physi-
cal pressure was uf course in a state of confusion.
The remnant of the battalion thus maimed was,
at the moment, without support; for, directly in
its rear, there were no formed troops coming on ;
and of the two battalions on its right hand and its
left, neither one nor the other had hitherto come
up abreast of it. On the other hand, the force
which our Fusilier Guards undertook to attack
was that majestic Vladimir column ■which had
just been defeating Sir George Brown. With a
strength of no more than perhaps some four or
five hundred men, the remnant of what had been
the centre battalion of the brigade of Guards was
advancing all alone, not merely against a breast-
work thick lined with Eussian soldiery, but also
against a hitherto victorious colunni which was
nearly 3000 strong. Still, the maimed battal-
ion pushed on ; but by this time it had so far
lost its symmetry that it had come to be, as it
were, two sides of a triangle — two sides of a
triangle whereof tlie salient pointed straight to
the front.
* His name, 1 have heard, was Ileskelh.
BATTLE OF TIIIC A1,MA. 217
At the forcniost point (ir apex llms f'oi'ined, cilAP.
Lindsay was carrying the Queen's colour ; and .
the swiftness of liis onward movement, coupled
with the eagerness of those who were near him to
keep up with the colour, may have been the cause
which refracted the line. There was a good deal
of impetuosity at this time, and it would seem
that the conception of what was the needful thing
to do was — not so much to labour after the re-
storation of complete order, but rather — to carry
the redoubt, and break down the great column by
a rush ; for in the midst of such shouts as ' For-
' ward Guards! Forward Guards' — Hugh Annesley
was heard cheering thus — the bent and irregular
line pressed on ; and at length it had moved so
far up the slope as to be within some thirty or
forty yards of the AVork. Then numbers of the
Russians burst out over the parapet, and some,
it is said, came straight on, with their bayonets
down ' at the charge.' The Queen's colour seemed
to be in danger ; for it was difficult to imagine
that these imperfectly formed companies of the
Fusilier Guards could maintain themselves long
against the overwhelming weight of the column
in their front. But the immediate cause which
brought about the retreat was, after all, the word
of command. I believe that the order to retire
which now reached the battalion was given by
the authority of General Henry Eentinck, the
officer commanding the brigade. It was delivered
to the line by the Adjutant of the Fusilier Guards.
With pistol in hand — for some of the Eussiau
218 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, soldiery were coming close down — Drummond,
^' the Adjutant of the battcalion, rode up and gave
the order to retire. By these words, as I gather,
the battalion was stopped ; but it did not instantly
obey tlie command to retire. There was a reluct-
ance to fall back ; and it would seem that the feel-
ing which caused this reluctance was not altogether
a false instinct ; for, however imperative the ne-
cessity for retreating may have been, the order
had come too late to avert the impending disaster;
and it is likely enough that, being, as they were,
in the close presence of a powerful enemy, our
men may have fancied there must needs be some
mistake in an order which directed them to go
about at a moment when no due arrangements
had been made for covering their retreat. Be this
as it may, the Adjutant (as it was his duty to do)
repeated the order. It seems he repeated it thrice;
and the last time, he was no longer content to say,
' the battalion will retire !' for he told it witli
force that it ' must,'
I know of no means that were taken for cover-
ing the retreat. If any were tried, tliey failed ;
for, the moment the battalion obeyed the word of
command, it lapsed into a state of disorder, and
then fell back in confusion. Seeing this, the
soldiery thrown out by the Paissians in advance
of their great column pushed forward witli in-
creasing boldness, and the Queen's colour was now
in greater danger than ever. But borne by a
resolute officer, and surrounded by resolute men,
it was guarded with care to the last, and kept safe
B.VTTLE OF Till-; ALMA. 21 9^
from llie enemy's tuucli.* At one moment, tlie chap.
foremost of the assailants were so close, that a "
soldier of tlie Fusilier Guards received a wound
in the hand from a bayonet. It was then that
the Fusilier Guards suffered the chief part of their
losses. By its retreat, the battalion seemed, as it
M'ere, to draw the enemy forward ; for the gi'cat
Vladimir column, which had hitherto stood halted
within the redoubt, now broke out over the i)ara-
pet, and undertaking pursuit, began to glide down
the slope.
For some time, a great part of the Fusilier
Guards remained in confusion on the lower part
of the slope ; but Dalrymple's, and also, I think,
Jocelyn's companies, were rallied so quickly as to
be enabled to partake of the fight which engaged
the Grenadier Guards ; and, before long, the main
part of the battalion had not only been re-formed
in advance of the road running parallel with the
river, but was briskly resuming its place in the
centre of the brigade of Guards.-f-
In the course of this struggle grave losses befel
the Scot« Fusilier Guards. Lord Chewton and
3 sergeants were killed. Colonel Dalrymple,
Colonel Berkeley, Colonel Hepburn, Colonel Hay-
garth, Astley, Bulwer, Buckley, Gipps, Lord En-
* It was for liis resolute defence of the colour at this juncture,
that Lindsay received the Victoria Cross.
+ In the report which the Duke of Cambridge addressed to
Headquarters the day next but one after the battle, H.R.II.
states tliat the Fusilier Guards re-formed ' with the grcateni
'alacritij.' Holograph MS. Report of the 22d September 1S54,
by H.R.H.
220 liATTLK OF TIIK ALMA.
CHAP, iiisinoro, find Ilngli Aiinesley* and 13 sergeants,
'• were wonnded ; and of tlic rank and fde 17 were
killed and 137 wounded.
Ti.e Wlien Colonel Hood consented to move forward
oiwrds."^'^ liis battalion against the colunm just defeated by
Lacy Yea, he at once caused his men to ascend
the bank which had hitherto sheltered it ; f and,
as soon as the battalion was on tlie top, its left
wing began to incur a good deal of fire from men
acting with the Vladimir column. Burgoyne,
carrying one of the colours, was w^ounded ; and,
the charge of the colours then devolving on Lieu-
tenant Robert Hamilton, he also in the ne.xt
minute was struck down by shot ; but he quickly
rose from the ground, recovered las hold of the
standard, and w^as able to carry it to the end of
Tiieir the battle. Under this fire, the battalion dressed
Uie'sioj'Io! its ranks with precision, and marched forward in
faultless order.| This perfect order it kept till
its left wing encountered some of the clusters of
* It happened tome afterwards to see and wonder at the higli
courat^e and composure with wliieh Annesley bore liis dreadful
wound. A musket-shot liad entered his jaw, and passed, tear-
ing its way through the moutli. The wound was of such a
kind that it seemed as lliougli nothing but death coukl be of
use to him. Yet lie was not only uneoiiijilaining, but able to
think and act for others.
+ Colonel Hood had not failed to seize the precious opportu-
nity which was offered to liis battalion by the sheltering steep-
ness of the bank. In a private letter he writes: 'Under the
' steej) bank of the river, we closed in to our centre ; and to
'this manoeuvre our after-success was mainly attributable.'
J 'We formed in perfect and compact order on the toj) of the
• bank, and then advanced steadily up the intrenched position.'
—Colonel Hood, private letter.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 221
iiieu coiuiiiii" down from the Great Itedoubt. Then Cii a r.
1
iiie battalion neatly opened -its ranks for the pas- L_
sayc of the retreating soldiery, and afterwards
formed wp anew. * This done, it marched on.
MeanwhiK>, General Codrington had been la- codrington
bouring to bring together the remnant of his someinenof
l>rigade. Sergeant 0'Ct)nnor, despite his grievous Division;
wound, still bore the colour of the Ifoyal Welsh,
which he had been carrying Mith loving care
throughout the worst stress of the tight. The
missing colour of the Iloyal Fusiliers, now com-
mitted to the honour of the Welsh regiment, was
borne by Captain Pearson. Around these two
standards General Codrington rallied such men
as he could gather, and made them open out and
form line two deep. The body thus formed num- an<i pioros-
bered about 300 men, and General Codi-ington thcnHuthe
wished to place it on the left of the Grenadiers, interval bc-
in order to fill a part of the chasm at that uioment baUaiionsof
1 ■ •, ■ ii , f> 1 Ti • 1 (■ the Guards.
lynig quite open m tJie centre ot the l)rigade ot
Guards.-}- But it occurred to him — for he was
himself a Guardsman, and he knew the feelings
of the corp.s — that to place soldiers of the line
abreast of the Grenadiers, and in the room of the
broken regiment, might give pain to a battalion of
* ' Our 6tli ami 7th companios opened out to let them pass,
' and closed up us coolly as if in Hyde Park.' — Colonel Hood,
jirivatc letter.
t Of course it is not intended that these words ' cliasni ' and
* interval ' (which occur in several places) shouUl be taken as
iudicatini^ that the Scots Fusilier Guards were far away, but
merely that, for the moment, the main body of the battalion
had lost its foruuition, and was rc-forining upon an alij^nmcnt
a little in rear of that on which the Grenadiers were standinjj.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
C H A P.
L
His
]i!iiIiosal
)ejt:ctetl
l.y tlie
Grenadier
Guards.
Continued
advance
of the
Grenadiers ;
the Guards; ?o he sent to the Greiiadievs to know
if they would like troops to come up to fill the
empty space. The answer was a proud one. It
was also, perhaps, a rash answer ; fur the Vladi-
mir column — compact and strong, with a sense of
the power it had just put forth — was not only
impending over the left front of the Grenadiers,
but also in part confronting the vacated interval.
However, the answer was ' No ! ' and the Grena-
diers, with their left flank stark open, but in beau-
tiful order, contentedly marched up the slope.*
The sentiment which had thus rejected the aid
proffered by General Codrington was not one nni-
versally entertained by the officers of the Guards.
A little later, and at a moment when the Grena-
diers were halted on the slope, with the Vladimir
coluuni impending over their left flank, Major
Hume of the 95th, and an ensign of the same
corps, came bearing the colours of their regiment,
and having with them eight men. Hume, accost-
ing Colonel Hamilton, who ctnumanded the left
wing of the Grenadiers, said that the eight men
* It was in disoljedience to the contingent orders he liad re-
ceived that Colonel Hood thus advanced with the Grenadiers.
In his journal he writes : 'Last order received by me was from
' Captain Fielding, Brigade-Major (when battalion was lying
' down under cannonade and .shelling) — " The Brigadier desires
' " you to conform to any movements on your left." ' Kow the
movement on Colonel Hooil's left, to which, by the words of
General Bentinck's orders, he thus found himself told to con-
form, was the retreat of the Fusilier Guards. In other word.s,
there had occurred an event which placed Colonel Hood under
orders to retire. Therefore it was that, inunediatcly after the
sentence above quoted, he wrote in his journal these words :
'Thank God, I disobeyed ! ! ! Advanced steadily iu line.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 223
tlieii following the colours of the 'Derbyshire' chap,
were all that remained together, and that he ^'
wished to take part with the Grenadiers in con- tiicsc joined
tinning the fight. Colonel Hamilton, assenting, ly other "
told Hume to fall in on the left of the Grenadiers, aligning
witli tliein
Afterwards, other men of the 'Ueibyshire came onuicirieft
up and joined their colours. A few moments
later, Colonel Berkeley came up, bringing with
him some men of the Scots Fusilier Guards, and
Colonel Dalrymple also acceded with a company
of the same regiment which he had held together
from the first. With General Bentiuck's sanction,
all these portions of what had been the centre
battalion formed line on the left of the Grenadiers.
These accessions, of course, did but little towards
filling the vacated interval ; but on the left of
the cbasm still open, there stood the ' Coldstream *
battalion. This battalion of the Guards con-
fronted the centre and right of the great Vladimir
column, and was drawn up in line with beautiful
precision. It had been much less exposed to fire The coid-
1 • 1 1 -1 n 1 11 T r stream.
and mishaps than either of the other battalions of
the brigade ; and, besides, had not been pressed
forward (as each of the two other battalions had
been) to meet any especial emerg(>ncy. So it fell
to the lot of this Coldstream battalion to become
an almost prim sample of what our Guards can
be in the moment which precedes a close fight.
"What the best of battalions is, when, in some
Royal Park at home, it manoeuvres before a great
princess, that the Coldstream was now on the
banks of the Alma, when it came to show its
22-i BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CIIA1\ graces to the enemy. And it was no ignoble
• pride that caused the battalion to maintain all
this ceremonious exactness ; for although it be
true that the precision of a line in peace - time
is only a success in mechanics, the precision of a
line on a hillside with the enemy close in front
is at once the result and the proof of a steady
warlike composure. And it ought to be borne in
mind that what our troops were now undertaking
in this part of the field was — not to swell the tide
of a victory, but — to try to retri<jve misfortunes.
Temper of Happily, it is then, just then, after a discom-
soMiery fiture sustaiucd in their front, that English sol-
after a dicry advancing m support oiten give superb
proof of their quality ; for by nature they are so
constituted, that the ill fortune of their comrades
does not commonly affect them with feelings of
discouragement, but, on the contrary, is apt to
heat their blood by rousing an emotion like anger ;
and, when they have thus been wrought upon,
they are sterner men for a foe to have to do witli
than they are when all has gone well.
The extreme left of the Coldstream was nearly
in the centre of the troops which the Duke of
Cambridge commanded, and with this battalion,
accordingly. His Royal Highness was present in
person. With it, also, there was a visitor, whose
presence showed the strength of the tie between
the officer and his regiment. Colonel Steele had
broken loose from his duty at Headquarters, and
was riding with his own beloved 'Coldstream.' *
* He was military secretary to Lord Ilaglan.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 225
JFurther to the left, and in the same formation, chap.
tlie three battalions of the Highland Brigade were _.
extended. But the 42d had found less difficulty Advance
than the 93d in getting through the thick ground HiKiii.md
and the river, and, again, the 9od had found less
difficulty than the 79th ; so, each regiment hav-
ing been formed and moved forward with all the
speed it could command, the brigade fell naturaUy
into direct Echelon of regiments, the 42d in front.
42d
93d
7yth
And although this order was occasioned by the
nature of the ground traversed, and not by design,
it seemed, nevertheless, so well suited to tlic work
in hand that Sir Colin Campbell did not for a
moment seek to change it.
These young soldiers, distinguished to the vul-
gar eye by their tall stature, their tartan uni-
forms, and the plumes of their Highland bonnets,
were yet more marked in the eyes of those wlio
know what soldiers are by the warlike carriage
of the men, and their strong, lithesome, resolute
step. And Sir Colin Campbell was known to be
so proud of them, that already, like the Guards,
they had a kind of prominence in the army, which
was sure to make their bearing in action a broad
mark for blame or for praise.
VOL. III. P
226 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. From the time when General I'uller had judged
• it right to abstain from bringing his force to the
The two support of his comrades in the Great Redoubt,
leiiiaiidng the two battalious which remained under his con-
Buii'er. '^"' trol had stood lialted near the bank of the river,
amd one of them, the 88th, was still formed in a
hollow square, as though expecting a charge of
cavalry. Sir Colin Campbell conceived that this
attitude of the 88th was unsuited to the time and
the place, and, not knowing that General Buller
in person was directing the regiment. Sir Colin,
in some anger, took upon himself to request, nay,
almost to command, that the hollow square should
be instantly changed into line-formation. When
the ranks of the Highlanders came up to this
part of the ground, and still went on continuing
their advance, a man of one of the halted regiments
— a man speaking perhaps in a coarse cynic
spirit, perhaps in the deep, honest bitterness of
his heart — cried out, ' Let the Scotchmen go on !
' they'll do the work ! ' Then the Highlanders
marched through, and continued their forward
movement.
After this, the 88th, although still formed in
square, and the 77th, then extended in line, were
both of them for the moment falling back; and
meanwhile the now dispersed soldiery who had
been forced to relinquish the redoubt were spread
out along the lower part of the slope firing power-
less shots towards the earthwork. It seemed to
Sir Colin Campbell that this state of discomfiture
on the part of Sir George r)rown's troops was fast
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 227
iuvolving the lute of the battle, and that it was a chap.
thing of great need to show, and to show at the .
very instant, a steady and well-formed battalion
ranged frank and fair on the slope. With this
intent he was carrying forward the 42d, and
placing it in advance of the alignment which
the Coldstream was taking up on his right. The
42d had just been taking ground to its left, and
was still in the formation which had been re-
sorted to for effecting the change — that is, it was
in open column of companies, 'right in front,' and
facing westwards, but was preparing to wheel in-
to line. So far as concerned all this part of the
field, the fight was in its crisis. The Staff of the
1st Division were near the left, or left front of
the Coldstream, and not far from the ground
where the grenadier company of the 42d stood
ranged. It was in this condition of things that
men heard a voice exclaiming, and uttering mis-
chievous words.
' The brigade; of Guards will be destroyed,' said su^gcstioc
one adviser ; and he asked whether it ought not to Guanis
fall back a little in order to recover its formation ? faii back.
These words, as I hear, were not spoken by an
officer holding any high rank, and accordingly
owe all their importance to the answer they
quickly elicited and the change which thereupon
followed.
He who answered the question * was a veteran
* He answered tlie question the moment he heard its purport
told to him. He had not himself heard it fall from tlie lips of
the oflBcer with whom it originated. — Note to 2d Edition.
228 BATTLE OF THE ALJIA.
CHAP, soldier, and it was with a deference no less wise
' than graceful tliat the Duke of Cambridge loved
to seek and to follow his counsels.
Bir Colin Whilst Eusigu Campbell was passing from boy-
Cainiibcll. , .
hood to mans estate, lie w,is made partaker m
the great transactions which were then beginning
to work out the liberation of Europe. In the
May of 1808 he received his first commission — a
commission in the 6th Foot ; and a few weeks
afterwards — then too young to carry the colours
— he was serving with his regiment upon the
heights of Vimieira. There, the lad saAV the
turning of a tide in human affairs ; saw the
opening of the mighty strife between 'Column'
and ' Line ; ' * saw France, long unmatched upon
the Continent, retreating before British infantry ;
saw the first of Napoleon's stumbles, and the
fame of Sir Artlnir Wellesley beginning to dawn
over Europe.
He was in Sir John Moore's campaign, and at
its closing scene — Corunna. He was with the
Walcheren expedition ; and afterwards, returning
to the Peninsula, he was at the battle of Barossa,
the defence of Tarifa, the relief of Taragona, and
the combats at Malaga and Osma. He led a
* In Iiis most interesting and most valuable ' Life of the Duke
' of Wellington,' Mr Gleig repeats the description of Vimieira,
wliich the Duke once gave in his presence at Strathfieldsaye.
The Duke's words are thus given by Mr Gleig : ' The French
' came on, on that occasion, with great boldness, and seemed
' to feel their way less than I always found them to do after-
' wards. They came on, as usual, in very heavy columns, and
* I received them in line, which they were not accu.stomed to,
' and we repulsed them three several times.'
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 229
forlorn hope at the storming of St Sebastian, and chap
was there wounded twice ; he was at Vittoria ; lie L_
was at the passage of the Bidassoa ; he took part
in the American war of 1814 ; he served in the
West Indies ; he served in the Chinese war of
1842. These occasions he had so well used that
his quality as a soldier was perfectly well known.
He had been praised and praised again and
again; but since he was not so connected as to be
able to move the dispensers of military rank, he
gained promotion slowly, and it was not until
the second Sikh war that he had a command as
a general : even then he had no rank in the army
above that of a colonel. At Chilianwalla he
commanded a division. Marching in person with
one of his two brigades, he had gained the heights
on the extreme right of the Sikh position, and
then bringing round the left shoulder, he had
rolled up the enemy's line and won the day ;
but since his other brigade (being separated from
him by a long distance) had wanted his personal
control, and fallen into trouble, the brilliancy of
the general result which he had achieved did not
save him altogether from criticism. That day
he was wounded for the fourth time. He com-
manded a division at the great battle of Gujerat ;
and there, — seizing discretion — he so used the ar-
tillery arm that whilst sparing his infantry, he yet
proved able to vanquish the whole right wing of the
enemy. In 1851 and the following year he com-
manded against the hill-tribes. It was he who
forced the Kohat Pass, It was he who, with only
230 BATILE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, a few horsemen and some guns, at Punj Pao,
■ compelled the submission of the combined tribes
then acting against him with a ibrce of 8000
men. It was he who, at Ishakote, with a force
of less than 3000 men, was able to end tlie strife ;
and when he had brought to submission all those
beyond the Indus who were in arms against the
Government, he instantly gave proof of the breadth
and scope of his mind as well as of the force of
his character; for he withstood the angry im-
patience of men in autliority over him, and
insisted that he must be suffered to deal with
the conquered people in the spirit of a politic and
merciful ruler.
After serving with all this glory for some
forty - four years he came back to England ;
but between the Queen and him there stood
a dense crowd of families — men, women, and
children — extending further than the eye could
reach, and armed with strange precedents which
made it out to be right that people who had seen
no service should be invested with high command,
and that Sir Colin Campbell should be only a
colonel. Yet he was of so fine a nature that,
although he did not always avoid great bursts
of anger, there was no ignoble bitterness in his
sense of wrong. He awaited the time when
perhaps he might have high command, and be
able to serve his country in a sphere proportioned
to his strength. His friends, however, were angry
for his sake ; and along with their strong devotion
towards him there was bred a liurce hatred of a
BATTLK OF THE ALMA. 231
system of military dispensation which could keep CHAP
in the background a man thus tried and thus ^'
known.
Upon the breaking-out of the war with Eussia,
Sir Colin was appointed — not to the command of
a division, but of a brigade. It was not till the
June of 1854 that his rank in the army became
higher than that of a colonel.
Campbell was not the slave, he was the master
of his calling, and therefore it was that he had
been able to save his intellect from the fate of
being drowned in military details. He knew
that although a general must have a complete
mastery of even the smallest of such things,
still they were only a part — a minute though
essential part — of the great science of war. He
understood the precious material whereof our
army is formed. He heartily loved our soldiery ;
for he was a soldier, and had fellow-feeling with
soldiers, and they had fellow-feeling with him.
Instinctively they knew that, together, they might
do great things — he by their help, they by his.
Knowing the worth of their devotion and their
bodily strength, he cherished them with watchful
care ; and they, on their part, loved, honoured,
and obeyed him with a faith that all he ordered
was right. He set great store upon discipline,
but it was never for discipline's sake that he did
so (as if that were itself an end), but because he
knew it to be one of the main sources of military
ascendancy. So, although the ofiicers and soldiers
serving under him got no more rest than was
232 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, good for them, they were never vexed wantonly;
. and in proportion as tliey grew in knowledge of
their calling, they came to understand why it
was that their chief compelled them to toil.
A bodily ardour for fighting may be more or
less masked and hidden ; but he to whom this
great passion has not been vouchsafed by nature,
is wanting in one of the qualities which go to
make a general. For warfare is so anxious and
complex a business, that against every vigorous
movement heaps of reasons can for ever be found;
and if a man is so cold a lover of battle as to have
no stronger guide than the poor balance of the
arguments and counter-arguments which he ad-
dresses to his troubled spirit, his mind, driven
first one way and then another, will oscillate, or
even revolve, turning miserably on its own axis,
and making no movement straight forward. Now,
it is a characteristic still marking the Scottish
blood, that often — and not the less so when it
flows in the veins of a gentle-hearted being — it
is seen to fire strangely and suddenly at the
prospect of a fight. Campbell loved warfare
with a deep passion ; and at the thought of battle
his grand, rugged face used to kindle with un-
controllable joy.
' The brigade of Guards will be destroyed ;
' ought it not to fall back ? ' * When Sir Colin
Camjjbell heard this saying, his blood rose so
high that tlie answer he gave — impassioned and
* As to the comparatively subordinate rank of the o£!icer with
whom this suggestion originated, see ante.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 233
far-resounding — was of a quality to govern chap.
events. "
' It is better, sir, that every man of Her Ma- campbeU's
answer to
* iesty's Guards should lie dead ui^on the field tiie sugges-
<> J I- tion that
'than that they should now turn their backs H''^^'?^'"'**
•^ should fall
' upon the enemy ! ' ^-'ck.
Then speaking apart to H.E.H. the Duke
of Cambridge, Sir Colin counselled him to go
straight on with the Guards, and at the same
time he himself undertook to turn the Redoubt
by at once moving up with his 42d Regiment.
Doubts and questionings ceased. The advance
was continued. Sir Colin Campbell rode off to
his left.
It was upon Sir Colin Campbell now, as on msdis-
General BuUer a short time before, that there of the
J . Highland
devolved the anxious duty of securing the Allied Brigade.
armies from any flank attack which might be
undertaken against them at a moment when our
troops were engaging the enemy in front ; and
Sir Colin, at one moment, judged that with the
battalion which formed his extreme left lie ought
to stand ready to show a front in any direction.
He, therefore, sent Sterling to direct that the 79th
should go into column.*
But, seen in the dim field of battle, an enemy's
force bears marked on its front faint, delicate,
momentous signs, analogous to those which, in
* It is from a body of troojjs massed in columu that the
greatest variety of manceiivres can he quickly and safely
evolved. When a battalion extended in line is called upon to
change its front, the radius of the segment in which it must
wheel is of course very long.
234 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, speaking of a man or a woman, are called 'expres-
^' ' sion of countenance;' and it is given to men who
know and love the business of war to be able to
read those signs. Sir Colin Campbell well under-
stood that the enemy ought to assail his left flank
with a storm of horse, foot, and artillery ; and, to
deal with any such onslaught, he at first took care
to stand ready ; but M'hen he came to ride for-
ward and gain liigher ground, tlie old soldier was
able to divine that with all their horsemen, and
all their columns of infantry, the Russians would
venture nothing against his flank. He tlierefore
recalled his order to the 79th, and allowed it to
go forward in line.
Including the chasm whicli divided the Grena-
dier Guards from the Coldstream, the whole line
in which the Duke of Cambridge now moved
forward to the attack of the Kourganc Hill was
more than a mile and a half in length.* It was
only two deep ; but his right regiment was sup-
ported by a part of Sir Richard England's Divi-
sion ; and Sir George Cathcart was on its left
* The Lst Division alone was upon a greater front than had
been covered by the 47th Regiment, Pennefatlier's brigade, and
the Light Division all put together, yet it did not cover a foot
more of ground than was right. We before saw the effect pro-
duced by trying to put ten battalions upon ground which was
now found to be not more than enough for six. It is hardly
necessary to say that a knowledge of the quantity of ground
covered by a single battalion in a barrack-yard would not give
a sufficient clue for getting at the extent of ground which
was covered by six battalions drawn up in line ujjon a field of
battle. Sir Colin Campbell was free to take ground to his
left, and he took it amply, contriving to outflank, or almost to
outflank, the enemy's infantry array.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 235
rear with the part of his Division tlieii on the
field. On the extreme left and left rear of the
whole force there was the cavalry under Lord
Lucan.
These troops were going to take part in the The nature
first approach to close strife which men had yet nowab^out*
seen on that day between bodies of troops in a plaSnthe
state of formation deliberately marshrdled against hX^'^"^
each other.* The slender red line which began
near tlie bridge, and vanished from the straining
sight on the eastern slopes of the Kourgan^ Hill,
was a thread which in any one part of it had
the strength of only two men. But along the
whole line, from east to west, these files of two
men each were strong in the exercise of their
country's great prerogative. They were in Eng-
lish array. They were fighting in line against
column.
After the rupture of the peace of Amiens, Sir
Arthur Wellesley, being then in India, became
singularly changed, growing every day more and
more emaciated, and seemingly more and more
sad. He pined ; and was like a man dying with-
out any known bodily illness, the prey of some
* The French liad not been engaged in any conflicts of this
sort, for, though the liead of Canrohert's Division confronted
formed troops for a moment at a distance of a few hundred yards,
it dropped Lack, as we saw, without lighting. Evans's struggle
had been in thick ground, not allowing regular array. Cod-
rington's people (including Lacy Yea's Fusiliers as well as the
stormers of the redoubt) had had hard fighting, and against
troops in peifect order, but they had gone through their strug-
gles without the advantage of being themselves in a state of
formation.
236 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, consuming thought. At length he suddenly an-
^' nounced to Lord Wellesley his resolve to go back
to England ; and when he was asked why, he
said, ' I observe that in Europe the French are
' fighting in column and carrying everything
' before them ; and I am sure that I ought to
' go home directly, because I know that our men
' can fight in line.' From that simple yet mighty
faith he never swerved ; for always encountering
the massive columns of infantry, he always was
ready to meet them with his slender line of two
deep. With what result the world knows.*
Long years had passed since the close of those
great wars, and now once more in Europe there
was going to be waged yet again the old strife of
line against column.
Looking down a smooth, gentle, green slope,
checkered red with the slaughtered soldiery who
had stormed the redoubt, the front-rank men of
the great Vladimir column were free to gaze upon
two battalions of the English Guards, far apart
the one from the other, but each carefully drawn
up in line ; and now that they saw more closely,
and without the distractions of artillery, they had
more than ever grounds for their wonder at the
* An aocount of Sir Arthur Wellesley's pining .sickness— hia
' wa.sting away,' as he himself described it — is given in pub-
lished accounts of men who remarked it (in Malcolm's book, I
think, or Monro's), and his disclosure of the motive Avhich
caused him to return to Europe was preserved and handed down
by Lord \Vellesle3'. What I have ventured to do is to seem to
connect the pining sickness with the mighty resolve which was
destined to change the fate of the world.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 237
kind of array in whicli the English soldiery were chap.
undertaking to assail them. 'We were all as- L„.
' tonished,' says Chodasiewicz — yet he wrote of
what he saw when the English line was much
less close to the foe than the Guards now were —
* we were all astonished at the extraordinary firm-
* ness with which the red-jackets, having crossed
* the river, opened a heavy fire in line upon the
' redoubt. This was the most extraordinary
' thing to us, as we had never before seen troops
' fight in lines of two deep, nor did we think it
' possible for men to be found with sufficient
* firmness of morale to be able to attack in this
' apparently weak formation our massive columns.
XXXI.
Beginning on our right hand with the Grena-
dier Guards, and the few men brought up along-
side them under Dalrymple, Berkeley, and Hume,
and going thence leftwards across the still open
' chasm ' to the Coldstream battalion, and, lastly,
going yet further leftwards to the array of the
Highland Brigade, we shall now see what manner
of strife it was when at length, after many a
hindrance, five British battalions, each grandly
formed in line, but imperilled by the yawning
gap at which tacticians might shudder, marched
up to the enemy's columns.
Advancing upon the immediate left of the
ground already won by Pennefathcr's brigade, the
Grenadiers were covered on their right, but their
238
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP.
I.
Princo
Gortscha-
kofTs ad-
vance Wltll
a column
of the
Vladimir
iorps.
left, or to speak more exactly, the left of the few
men aligning with them, remained altogether un-
covered ; and it was over the very ground thus
lying wide open before them that the Vkidiniir
battalions stood impending.
The Grenadiers were marching against the de-
feated but now rallied Kazan column which had
fought with the Eoyal Fusiliers, when Prince
Gortschakoff rode down to the two left battalions
of the Vladimir, and undertook to lead them for-
ward in person. First sending his only unwounded
aide-de-camp to press the advance of any troops he
could find, the Prince put himself at the head of
the two left Vladiuiir battalions, and ordered them
to charge with the bayonet. The Prince then rode
forward a good deal in advance of his troops, and
his order for a bayonet-charge was so far obeyed,
that the column, without firing a shot, moved boldly
down towards tlie chasm which had been left in
the centre of our brigade of Guards. The north-
west angle of this strong and hitherto victorions
column was coming down nearer and nearer to
the file — the file composed of only two men —
which formed the extreme left of the Grenadiers.
Then, and by as fair a test as war could a])ply,
there was going to be tried tlie str(ingth of the
line-formation, the quality of the English officer,
and the quality of the English soldier. Colonel
Hood brought the line to a halt, and was about
to execute the manoeuvre which will be presently
mentioned, when his troops had to meet a new
peril in the apparition of that unknown 'mounted
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 239
'officer' who so often comes riding up in moments chap.
of crisis, directs the troops to fall back, and then '
all at once gallops away without having been amfvdcr
surely identified. The horseman approached the "^nolJlfted
left flank company of the Grenadiers, and cried '"'«'=er-'
out 'Ketire!' But Colonel Henry Percy look-
ing at the Vladimir column, and seeing at the
instant what ought and what ought not to be
done, met the danger by promptly insisting that
the movement really meant to be enjoined by
the mounted officer must needs be that very
one which the conjuncture seemed to require,
'lietire!' said Colonel Percy. 'What the devil
' can they mean ? They must mean " dress back'"
and in the next moment, Percy (acting under
the authority of Colonel Hamilton who command-
ed the left wins), aided by Neville his senior Mancruvic
'-"' "^ _ executed
subaltern, bcKan causin" the left subdivision of M'^'-e
the left flank company to ' dress back ' at such Guards.
an angle as to make it face the Vladimir column ;
and this, it quickly appeared, was exactly what
Colonel Hood wished, for he rode up and directed
Colonel Percy to go on with the operation.
The wound Percy received at this time did not
hinder him from completing his task, and in a
few moments the subdivision stood ranged on a
line so refracted as to be forming an obtuse angle
with the rest of the battalion. So whilst, with
the main part of his force, he still faced the Kazan
battalions that had confronted him from the first,
Colonel Hood showed also a front — a small, but
smooth, comely front — to the Vladimir column
240 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
Cii A 1'. now coming on with a mind to turn his left flanlc,
• and march straight down through the chasm. In
an instant, his ready niauceuvre brought tlie
Vladimir troops to a lialt; and men seeing the
stately battalion thus adapting its front to the
exigency, and stopping the enemy's column, might
well enough say that the colonel was handling
his fine slender English blade with a singular
grace — with the gentleness and grace of the
skilled swordsman, when, smiling all the while,
:ta effect, he parries an angry thrust. In the midst of its
Kazan Column.s.
Vladimir Column.
oo
/^
Grenadier Guards.
pride and strength, the Vladimir found itself
checked, nay, found itself gravely engaged with
troops so few as to comprise hut half a company
of our Guardsmen. They were aided, however,
by Dalrymple with the company of the Scots
Fusilier Guards which we saw him bring up ; for
he put his line into conformity with the change
of front effected by Percy ; and the like was done
also by those few other soldiers under Berkeley
and Hume who had ranged themselves on Colonel
Hood's left. Thus the fire of perhaps altogether
some six or seven score of men was brought to
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 241
bear upon the Vladimir column, and with effect, chap.
for it poured into a close mass of living men. '
Colonel Dalrymple fired in volleys, and com-
placently counted them, reckoning up no less
than fifteen ; but the Grenadiers chose another
method, and stood file-firing along their whole line.
On the left of the chasm still open in the TiieCoia-
centre of the brigade of Guards, and on ground
less advanced than that reached by Colonel Hood's
Grenadiers, there stood the Coldstream battalion
commanded by Colonel Upton, and drawn up in
magnificent order; but to this spot, apparently,
the ' unknown mounted officer ' must have sped,
when he vanislied from the sight of the Grena-
diers, for down tlie ranks of the Coldstream the
word was passed to 'Retire;' and 'the retire,' Assaiiea
moreover, was sounded by buglers along the to retire?
line ; * but the false command was met by an
outburst of regimental opinion expressed in loud
cries of ' No ! No ! ' This resistance alone, it its resist,
would seem, proved strong enough to counteract '
the false order, for the Coldstream battalion kept
its ground, then advanced, and was soon direct-
ing its fire upon the two more battalions which
formed the right wing of the Yladimir.
We shall see the share that other Russian
and other British troops were destined to have
in governing the result of the struggle; but if
for a moment we limit our reckoning to the
* With respect to the 'unknown mounted officer,' and the
perturbing commands often given to our troops in action with-
out apparent authority, see Appendix, No. VI.
VOL III. Q
242
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP.
I.
The Greiia-
Uit'is and
the 'Colil-
' Btream '
eiitj.iged
witli six
liattalions
ill column
The stress
which a
line puts
uiiou the
soldiery of
a column ;
troop.s which stood fightiii^L; at thi.s time, it ap-
pears that the whole of the four Vladimir bat-
talions and the lessened mass of the left Kazan
column were engaged with the Grenadiers and
the Coldstream. In other words, two English bat-
talions, each ranged in line, but divided the one
from the other by a very broad chasm, were con-
tending with six battalions in column. And al-
though of these six battalions standing in column
there were two which had cruelly suffered, the
remaining four had hitherto had no hard fight-
ing, and were flushed with the thought that they
stood on ground which they themselves had re-
conquered.
XXXII.
Bat, after all, if only the firmness of the slen-
der English line should chance to endure, there
was nothing except the almost chimerical event
of a thorough charge home with the bayonet
which could give to the columns the ascendancy
due to their vast weight and numbers ; for the
fire from a straitened, narrow front could com-
paratively do little harm, whilst the fire of the
battalion in line was carrying havoc into the liv^
ing masses. Still, neither column nor line gave
way. On the other hand, neither column nor
line moved forward. East rooted as yet to the
ground, the groaning masses of the Eussians and
the two scarlet strings of C.uardsmen stood receiv-
ing and delivering fire.
But meanwhile, on the part of the English,
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 243
another mind, as we shall see by -and -by, was chap.
bringing its strength to bear upon this part of the '
battle.
If the English array puts a grievous stress and upon
?,. . /-. • 1 • a general
Upon the soldiery ot Continental masses, its who has
. , . . cliarge of
pressure is not less hard upon the mind of a columns,
general who has the suffering columns in his
charge. It not only condemns him to know of
the havoc that is rending his people upon a small
space of ground within the reach of his own sight,
and his own hearing, but afflicts him besides with
a sense of being largely outflanked ; and, although
he may be really contending with foes who are
but few against many, he sometimes becomes
oppressed by a belief that he is overwhelmed by
mighty numbers. General Kvetzinski was with
tlie right Vladimir column. He was a brave,
able man, and we have already seen something of
what the relative numbers were with which the
Russians and the English were fighting ; but it impressions
seems that the spectacle of the extended front upon the
mind of
presented by the English array broke down the Kvetzinski
General's sense of his own comparative strength, iish array,
and put upon him the belief that he was cruelly
outnumbered. Even the sight of the wide chasm
there was between the two battalions of the
Guards did not lift the weight from his heart.
' The enormous forces,' said he, — ' the enormous
' forces of the enemy made our position a very
' dangerous one.'
It was near the eastern shoulder of the redoubt
that he sat in liis saddle. Every moment he
244 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, had been growing more anxious, for, besides the
^' troubles that were besetting liis front, he could
not but know that Pennefather's brigade was
established in the Pass ; and the apparition of
our Headquarter staff on the knoll, followed
quick by Turner's guns, had cheated hira into the
notion that the whole French army was marching
straight eastward into the English field of battle.
Nay, he imagined that the guns on the knoll were
throwinix a flaukin<:f fire into the left of his Vladi-
niir battalions ; * and indeed it would seem that
these battalions were really struck — not by shot
* He was wrong in this. Turner's guns tried their range
against the cohimns on the KourganJ; Hill, Iiut found the dis-
tance too great. The passage in which Kvetzinski speaks of
the state of things in the direction of ' the knoll ' is this : —
' From the left, the French, having forced our left-wing fore-
' posts, were hurrying to the rescue of their allies, whose
' efforts were beginning to Hag before the unheard-of and un-
' paralleled heroism of the brave Vladiuiirtzi. The French
' battery, having takeii up its position on the left wing of our
' side' (this so-called 'French battery' was Turner's battery on
the knoll), ' began to fire sideways on the fast-thinning ranks
' of our gallant regiment. Their reserve were hastening to cut
* off our retreat.' I have already shown how all but inevit-
able it was that Kvetzinski and all other Russians on the Kour-
ganfe Hill should make this mistake— should suppose that the
group of plumed officers in blue frocks who crowned the knoll
betokened the presence of the French army in that part of
the field, and that Turner's guns were a French battery. H
amongst the French or their friends there are any men so con-
stituted as to wish to keep the benefit derived from this mistake,
their best course will be to quote this passage from Kvetzinski,
and to suppress the explanation which shows how his error
arose. For the sake of fairness, and not without a foresight of
the wrongful use which may be made of the passage, I give
what I believe to be a close and accurate translation from the
Russian words in which it was written.- -i\"'o/c to \st Edition.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 245
tliscliarged from the knoll, but from some of chap,
Franklin's guns then newly established in battery
u])on a spur overlooking the Pass.* But now,
when he looked to his right — when he looked
slantwise down to the east of where the Cold-
stream stood ranged — he saw an array of tall
plumes, having eight times the front of one of his
own battalion columns ; looking a little farther
eastward, he saw another array which, though it
was not yet so near, was like to the first, and was
moving. Again, when he looked still farther
eastward, he saw yet another array coming up,
and though it was less near than the first, and
even less near than the second, it was like to
either of them in the greatness of its front and
the towering plumes of the men. Kvetzinski
could see that, taken together, these three lines
of plumed soldiers had a front some twenty
times broader than one of his battalion columns,
and (still, it seems, suffering himself to infer vast
numbers from mere extent of front) he began to
have that torturing sense of being outnumbered
and outflanked which weighed upon the memory
and for ever replenished the diction of the warlike
Psalmist. It seemed to him that the enemy ' in-
' creased upon him to trouble him ; ' that ' the
* I rest this belief entirely upon the authority of Colonel
Hamley's soldierly narrative, 'Tlie Campaign of Sebastopol,' p.
3L Colonel Hamley was himself in the Artillery, and all that
he says respecting the operations of the arm to which he
belonged has, of course, a peculiar value. The guns were some
of those thirty pieces of ordnance which Evans and Sir Kichard
England had just brought into the Pass. — Note to \st Edition.
246 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. ' nations compassed liim round about;' that they
^' ' came round about him like water ; ' tliat they
' kept him in on every side ; yea, that they kept
' him in on every side.' This anxiety was all
wrongly based. Far from having his whole array
outilanked towards the east to any w'oeful extent,
Kvetzinski had a column on his extreme right
which fairly enough confronted the extreme left
of the English infantry ; and, far indeed from
being himself outnumbered, he was largly out-
numbering his adversaries ; but it followed from
the difference between liis and his enemy's man-
ner of fighting that each of his columns, taken
separately, was widely outflanked, and he was
becoming an example of what must happen to
the commander of colunms when (without exert-
ing his weight by trying to charge home with the
bayonet) he strives to set his dense masses against
troops standing firmly in line.
Tiie sight of Presently, he saw that the array of plumed
advanoing soldicrs wliich had stood ranged next to the Cold-
ui>on his
lightfront stream was moving — was moving up — was mov-
convmces
him that ing swiftly ; and he knew that the nearest of the
he must ° "^ ' , . . ,
move. columns which he had on his right was so far
from the ground where he stood, and so hindered,
too, by the intervening dip of the ground, as to
be unable to engage the new-comers before the
moment when (unless he retreated) they would
reach the flank of his right Vladimir battalions.
On the other hand, lie could not, in common
prudence, stand still and wait to be turned by the
battalion now gliding up the slope on his right;
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 247
for brave as were his Vladimir men, a huge mas- cpiap.
sive Eussian column was not the delicate weapon '
with which he could try to imitate Colonel Hood,
showing a front at once on two sides. Therefore
it became but too clear to him that the columns
along the redoubt must move to some ground other
than where they were, and this almost instantly,
for the bending plumes did not cease from coming.
But, also, all this while, the columns along the Meantime
tlie colunina
redoubt had been more and more feeling the stress along the
^ redoubt are
that was put upon them by the iire and the array becoming
^ '- "^ '' distressed
of the Guards. After the moment when the bytiiecre
of the
Vladimir men were brought to a halt by Colonel Guards.
Hood's manoeuvre. Prince Gortschakoff, still rid-
ing at the head of the column, was violently
thrown to the ground. He had received no
wound from the shot which caused his fall, but
his charger was killed by it ; and, there being no
other horseman near, he was obliged to remain on
foot. It would seem that the concussion of the
fall may have clouded his judgment. At all
events, after this accident he walked away to-
wards a column which he saw coming down in
support.* On his road he passed through the site
of the Great Eedoubt, and there found General
Kvetzinski. The Prince, walking up to the Divi-
sional General, told him that he had had his horse
shot under him, and that all the field-officers of
the regiment -f- he commanded had been killed.
It is not stated that the two generals, thus meet-
* The four Ouglitz battalions.
+ Meaniug, 1 imagine, the Kazan Chasseurs.
218 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. in<!' at a critical inomeiit, took occasion to consult
I
' about the way in which they should fight out the
battle. AVlien their conversation had ended,
Prince Gortschakoff walked up the hillside to-
wards a column he wanted to meet.*
The shot which dismounted Prince Gortscha-
koff, his departure from the ground where the
Vladimir stood, the spruce beauty of the slender
red line which had brought it to bay, and the
steadiness of the fire with which the brave column
had been plied for now several minutes — all these
were causes which helped to distress the left Vla-
dimir battalions ; and although it was the turning
movement on the right of the Eussian columns
which made it a thing of sheer need to move, and
to move at once,"!- still, it would seem that General
Kvetzinski's measures for dealing with the new
emergency were forestalled by what he presently
saw on his left front ; and the event which was
destined to put its actual and direct governance
upon this part of the battle was the still pending
fight between the left Vladimir battalions and the
Grenadier Guards. J
* All this is told by Prince Gortscliakofl' himself with sim-
plicity and apparent truthfulness. It is plain that his fall had
shaken and confused liim.
-|- Kvetzinski says, ' The decisive moment I had been fearinf»
' and expecting had arrived : the English moved higher up in
' three lines, and threatened to turn our right wing.'
t ' The left wing,' he says, 'began to falter, leaving my left
' side exposed.' I nndenstand him to be speaking of troops on
the immediate left of the column witli which he was riding, and
not ot any troops on the left of the whole Division which he
commanded, because the retreat of tlie troops in the Pass had
taken place before the time of which he is speaking.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 249
The Grenadiers, when we left them just now, chap.
were busy with their rifles along their whole line, ^'
and were making good use of that delicate bend continuanco
in the formation of their leftmost company which betweeift'he
enabled them to pour their fire into the heart of Guards and
the left
the Vladimir column then hanging on their flank, viadimir
r^>^ , . f> i • i i • • column.
ihe reckoning ot hira who puts his trust m
column is mainly based on the notion that its
mere grandeur of aspect will give it a clear as-
cendant as soon as it is seen at all near ; and
when the English line had once delivered its fire,
the front-rank men of the column w^ere not with-
out grounds for making sure that their next
glimpse of the red-coats would be a glimpse of
men in retreat ; for to have come forward to with-
in a distance convenient for musket-shots and to
have once delivered their fire, this was surely the
utmost in the way of close fighting that files of
only two men each would attempt against masses.
But when, though only a little, the smoke began
to lift, the gleams that pierced it were the light
that is shed from bayonet-points and busy ram-
rods— gleams twinkling along the line of the two
ranks of soldiery who still, as it seemed, must be
lingering in their strange array ; and wherever
the smoke lifted clear, there — steadfast as oaks
disclosed by rising mist — the long avenue of the
Bearskins loomed out, and so righteously in place
as to begin to enforce a surmise that, after all, the
files of the two men each might be minded to
stand where they were, ceremoniously shooting
into the column and filling it minute by minute
250 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, with the tumult of men killed or wounded. And
• though it was but a few of the men planted cIosg
in the massive columns who could thus from time
to time look upon the dim forms of the soldiery
who dealt the slaughter, yet the anxiousness of
those who could gain no glimpse of the Bearskins
was not for that reason the less. Nay, it was
the greater; for he who knows of a present danger
through his reading of other men's countenances,
or by seeing his neighbours fall wounded or killed
around him, is commonly more disturbed than he
who, standing in the front, looks straight into the
eye of the storm.
Still, up to this time it was only from the ex-
ti'eme left of the Grenadiers' line that fire was
poured into the column. A harder trial was
awaitinsr the Vladimir men. Colonel Hood had
hitherto wielded his line as though he judged it
right to deal carefully with the left Kazan bat-
talions still lingering on his front; and, up to
the last, he did not think himself warranted
in disdaining their presence, for he could not
know that their loss in officers had made them
so helpless as they were ; but he now saw
enough to assure him that his real foe was the
left Vladimir column on his flank. Thither,
therefore (though he would not altogether avert
his line from the defeated troops in his front), he
now determined to bend the eyes and the rifles of
a great portion of his battalion. So he wheeled
forward his battalion upon its left — or in other,
and perhaps the more expressive, form of uiili-
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 251.
tary speech, he 'brought forward his right shoul- chap.
' der.' * Still respecting the presence of the '
defeated Kazan troops, he did not carry this man-
oeuvre so far as to place his battalion bodily
on the flank of the Vladimir column ; but he
carried it far enough to make the column a mark
for the troops which formed his left wing. The
Vladimir Column.
I Grenadier Guards.
Vladimir was wrapped in fire ; was wrapped in
that fire which is hardly tolerable to soldiery
massed in column — fire poured upon its flank.^f
* 'I brought up my right shoulder.' — Private letter from
Colonel Hood, dated the day after the battle. One of the
characteristics \yhich can hardly fail to interest any one who
has had the advantage of reading Colonel Hood's letters, is the
exceeding modesty which makes him continuall}' seek to ascribe
all merit to others rather than to himself. Thus, although, in
hurriedly writing the six words above quoted, he chanced to
use the first person, he hastened, in a subsequent letter from
the banks of the Alma, to give the whole merit of the man-
ceuvre to the battalion. He writes, 'Instinctively our men
biought right shoulders forward.' — Note to ith Edition.
t ' Instinctively our men brought right shoulders forward,
' and commenced file-firing with such coolness and accuracy
' that the effect was instantaneous. They [the Eussians] were
' checked perceptibly with astonishment at the telling nature
of our flank-fire.' N.B. — The word which I have \\Titten ' per-
' ceptibly ' seems in the original to have the syllable ' im ' at
its commencement, but I imagine that the word as I have
written it was the one intended.- -iVbie to ith Edition.
252 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAT. ]'A'eii this, lor some minutes, the brave Vladimir
' bore. *
If the voice of the English soldier is lieard
loud in fight, his sliout may be the shout of
triumph acliievod, or else — and then it is of a
thousandfold higher worth — it may be the like
of what used to foretoken the crisis of the old
Peninsular battles, when late in the day the voice
of ' the Light Division ' was heard ; — the almost
inspired utterance by which the soldier, growing
suddenly conscious of an overmastering power,
declares and makes known his ascendant. Of
two things happening in a field of battle, at
nearly the same time, it is often hard to say
which was the first; and yet upon that narrow
priority of a few moments there may dejjend the
question of which event was the cause, and which
the effect. What people know is, that there was
an instant when the Vladimir column was seen
to look hurt and unstable, and that, either at the
same instant, or the instant before, or the instant
after, the Grenadiers were hurrahing on their
left, hurrahing at their centre, hurrahing along
their whole line. As though its term of life were
measured — as though its structure were touched
and sundered by the very cadence of the cheer-
ing— the column bulged, heaving, heaving. ' The
'line will advance on the centre !■)* The men
* Speaking of course roughly. Colonel Hood puts this period
of Russian endurance at 'five minutes.' Private letter, 21st
Sept. 1854. — Note (o ilh Edition.
t In this, and in the sentence presently following where it
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 253
' may advance firing.'* This, or this nearly, was CHAP.
what Hood had to say to his Grenadiers. Instant '
sounded the echo of his will: 'The line will
'advance on the centre! Quick march!' Then
between the column and the seeing of its fate
the cloud which hangs over a modern battle-field
was no longer a sufficing veil; for although,
whilst the English battalion stood halted, there
lay in front of its line that dim, mystic region
which divides contending soldiery, yet the Bear-
skins, since now they were marching, grew darker
from east to west, grew taller, grew real, broke
through. A moment, and the column hung loose ; Defeat of
another, and it was lapsing into sheer retreat ; viadLir
yet another, and it had come to be like a throng Snd™ the
in confusion.t Of the left Kazan troops there battaifon"
v/as no more question. In an array which was
all but found fault with for being too erand
and too stately, the English battalion swept on.|
recurs, the word 'ou' slioiikl be replaced by the word 'by.'--
Note to ith Edition.
* ' Unsupported I would not charge, but made my men ad-
' vance, firing steadily.' Private letter from Colonel Hood,
21.st Sept. l%U.—Note to 4th Edition.
t ' In five minutes the Russian column faltered, then turned,
' then ran.' Private letter from Colonel Hood, 2Lst Sept.
1S54.— Note to 4th Edittion.
t The criticism alluded to in this sentence was that of a
French officer who witnessed the advance ot the Guards. After
speaking of it witli enthusiastic admiration, he ended by saying
that it was 'too majestic'— 'trop majestueux.' — End of Note to
\sl Edition.
Speaking of this advance of his Grenadiers, Colonel Hood
writes : ' I am told the effect was great, and this common-sense
' manuccvrc of a line against a dense column is my only merit.
' It was done at "Waterloo effectively, and on the Alma yester-
254 BATTLE OF THE ALRLV.
c 11 A r. Seeing that, before many moments were over,
^' the Grenadiers would be up in the redoubt
Kvetzinski's Kvetziuski conceived that his retreat by the
movement great road was already cut off, and he ordered
witii the that the right Vladimir column — the column
mir column, witli whicli lie was present — should move
from the field obliquely, avoiding the English
right. This was a path which would take the
column along the eastern skirts of the Kourgaue
Hill, and bring it towards the spot where the
right Kazan column stood posted. Kvetzinski,
still firm and soldierly, charged a few of his
men with the duty of covering his retreat ; and,
entrusting the command of this little rear-guard
to Ensign Berestoffsky, gave orders that the march
should be leisurely. He was not ill obeyed ; but
the movement was hardly one which could be
executed with all the accustomed dignity of Rus-
sian troops in retreat, for the column had to move
slantwise across the front of the battalion which
was swiftly ascending the hill, and, if it were to
' clay. I hope due credit will be done to my fine fellows, for it
' was a proud sight to see tliem behave so well ; and what an
' iionour to command such a body of men ! . . . The bat-
' talion has been tlie admiration of French, Englisli, and Rus-
' sians.' — Private letter, 21st September 1854.
My numerous quotations from tlie private journal and private
letters of Colonel Hood correspond so closely with the tenor of
this part of the narrative that the reader will be likely to say,
' That journal and those letters were evidently tlie authority
' on which the Author based his account of the operations
' of the Grenadier Guards.' It is, however, a fact, that I never
saw the journal nor the letters, and never knew anything of
their tenor, until after the publication of the first and second
editions of this book. — Note to ilk Edition.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 255
lose many moments, the plumed soldiery would chap.
be on its flank. 1
The left wing of the Grenadiers was quickly The Duke
in the part of the battery where lay the dis- bridge is
■^ . '' '' master of
mounted howitzer ; and on the opposite or eastern the Great
' ^ ^ Redoubt.
shoulder of the work, the Duke of Cambridge,
riding up with the Coldstream, stood master of
the Great Eedoubt.
In its retreat the right Vladimir column was KvetzinsUi
still plied with the fire of the Coldstream. Gen- !-md dis- ^^
eral Kvetzinski had his horse shot under him ; '
and presently afterwards he was so wounded in
the leg as to be unable to move on foot. The
soldiers around him formed a litter for him with
their muskets, and the brave man, causing his
bearers to march with the rear-guard, continued
to give his orders to Ensign Berestoffsky. Pre-
sently, however, he was again struck by shot;
and indeed he was now almost shattered, beinw
wounded in two of his limbs, and in the side.
To the last he had comported himself as a good
soldier.
XXXIII.
But whose was the mind which had freshly
come to bear upon this part of the fight, and
what was the plumed array which, threatening
Kvetzinski on his right front, forbade him from
further tarrying on the line of the Great Eedoubt ?
Before the moment when the Guards and the
columns began their fight, Sir Colin Campbell
was sitting in his saddle by the left of the Cold
256 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, stream, and talking from time to time with the
1.
Duke of Cambridge. The veteran was watching
Sir Colin for his time. And, although the ground before
Campbell's i • f. i ,. i •
concfeptioii liim tavoured the concealment oi troops, yet his
of the part ,.,,. ,. „ ^iipi
he would skill in the readinjj of a field of battle had
take with . °
his brigade, enabled him to see, or in some way know or
divine, that what forces the liussians had on
their right of the Great liedoubt were all more
or less held back. So, if he could swiftly move
up a battalion to the crest which rose straight
before him, he would be on the flank of the
position from which the Vladimir confronted the
Guards before any other battalions could come
down to engage him.* Upon descrying his ad-
vance, the Kussians, he thought, would see the
instant need of abandoning their struggle with
the Guards ; but if by chance, or because of their
obstinacy, they should fail to do so, then, as soon
as he could reach the ground he longed for, he
would bring round the left shoulder, turn full
towards the west, and roll up the Muscovite
columns before their supports could come down
to save them. This was what lie thought might
be done ; and the keen, perfect weapon with
which to do it had come fresh into his hand.
The 42(1 was Tlic otlicr battalious of the Highland Brigade
were approaching ; but the 42d — the far-famed
' Black Watch ' — had already come up. It was
* 'The immediate object being to turn the redoubt, wlule
' the attack in front was made l)y the Guards.' Original JIS.
Report, dated ' Bivouac on the river Alma, '22d September
' 1854,' and signed ' ('. ('unipbell, Major-Ceneral.'— vVo^c to ilk
Edition.
BATTLE OF THE AL.MA. 257
ranged in line. Tlie ancient glory of the corps ciiAP.
was a treasure now committed to the charge of '
young soldiers new to battle ; but Campbell
knew them — was sure of their excellence — and
was sure, too of Colonel Cameron, their command-
ing officer. Very eager — for the Guards were now
engaged with the enemy's columns — very eager,
yet silent and majestic, the battalion stood ready.
Before the action had begun, and whilst his sircoiin
Campbell
men were still in column, Campbell had spoken and the
^ -^ Highland
to his brigade a few words — words simple, and, Brigade,
for the most pait, workmanlike, yet touched with
the fire of warlike sentiment, 'Now men, you
' are going into action. Ecmember this : wlio-
' ever is wounded — I don't care what his rank
' is — whoever is wounded must lie where he
' falls till the bandsmen come to attend to him.
' 'No soldiers must go carrying off wounded men.
' If any soldier does such a thing, his name shall
' be stuck up in his parish church. Don't be in
* a hurry about firing. Your officers will tell you
* when it is time to open fire. Be steady. Keep
' silence. Fire low. Now, men ' — those who
know the old soldier can tell how his voice
would falter the while his features were kindling
— * Now, men, the army will watch us ; make
' me proud of the Highland Brigade ! ' *
* Of course, the memory of those who unexpectedly found
themselves hearing Sir Colin's address to his brigade, can supply
but an imperfect record of the words which were uttered ; and
perhaps, if the impressions of any gi'eat number of the hearers
were compared, few or none would be found to be closely simi-
lar. I think, however, that the address given in the text is not
VOL. IIL U
Tlieir en-
Willi several
liussian
2oS BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. It was before tlic battle that thi.s, cr the like
_ of this, was addressed to the brigade ; and uov,
when Sir Colin rode up to the corps which await-
ed his signal, he only gave it two words. But,
ciuinns. ijccause of his accustomed manner of utterance,
and because he was a true, faithful lover of war,
the two words he spoke were as the roll of the
drum: 'Forward, 42dl' This was all he then
said; and, 'as a steed that knows his rider,' the
great heart of the battalion bounded proudly to
his touch.
Having directed his staff not to follow him,*
Sir Colin Campbell -went forward alone in front
of tl)e 42d ; but before he had ridden far, he
saw that his reckoning was already made good
by the event, and that the column which had
engaged the Coldstream was moving off obliquely
towards its right rear. AVhen the 42d had come
up, he was rejoined by his Staff, and he then rode
up a good May in advance, for he was swift to
hope that the withdrawal of the column from the
line of the redoubt might give him the means of
learning the ground before him, and seeing how
the enemy's strength was disposed in this part of
the field. In a few moments he was abreast of
the redoubt, and upon the ridge or crest which
divided the slope he had been ascending from the
broad and rather deep hollow which lay before
grossly wide of the truth : at all events, I can answer for the
substantial accuracy of the injunction against quitting tlie
ranks in order to carry off wounded men.
* Because he knew that a group of oiriuers would be likely
to draw more fire tlian a sinifle horseman.
BiTTLE OF THE ALMA. 2') 9
liiin. On liis riglit lie liad tlie now empty re- chap,
doubt, on his right front the liiglier slopes of the '
Kourgane Hill. Straight before him there was
the hollow, or basin, just spoken of, bounded on
its farther side by a swelling wave or ridge of
ground which he called the 'inner crest.' Be-
yond that, whilst he looked straight before him,
he could see that the ground fell off into a valley;
but when he glanced towards his left front he
observed that the hollow before him was, so to
speak, bridged over by a bending rib which con-
nected the inner with the outer crest — bridged
over in such a way that a column on his left
front might march to the spot where he stood
M'ithout having first to descend into the lower
ground. jNIore towards his left, the ground was
high, but so undulating and varied that it would
not necessarily disclose any troops which might
be posted in that part of the field.
Confronting Sir Colin Campbell from the other
side of the hollow, the enemy had a strong col-
umn— the two right battalions of the Kazan corps
— and it was towards this body that the Vladimir
column, moving off from the line of the redoubt,
was all this time making its way. The Paissians
saw that they were the subject of a general offi-
cer's studies ; and Campbell's horse at this time
was twice struck by shot, but not disabled.
When the retiring column came abreast of the
right Kazan troops it faced about to the front,
and took part with them in opposing a strength
of four battalions — four battalions hard worked
200 BATTLE or THE ALMA.
CHAP, and much tliinuLMl — \u ihe one which, eager and
__^: fresh, was following the steps of the Highland
General. Looking towards his left front, and
alons the natural bridge or viaduct which has
just been spoken of, Sir Colin Campbell saw an-
other column nmch heavier than cither of the
two which confronted him. This heavy column
Avas composed of two battalions of the Sousdal
corps, and it Nvas of greater size and strength
than the Vladimir and the Kazan columns,
because it was as yet untouched. A column
formed of the two remaining Sousdal battalions
— battalions also untouched — was on the ex-
treme right of the enemy's infantry po.sition,
but so placed that at this moment it could not
be seen by Campbell. On the higher slopes of
the Kourgane Hill, the four Ouglitz battalions
stood impending over the scene of the coming
fight, and these battalions were also untouched.
With three battalions Sir Colin Campbell was
about to engage no less than twelve ; but the
three were in line, and the twelve were massed
in five columns.
The time that it took Sir Colin Campbell to
learn the ground before him, and to read the
enemy's mind, proved almost enough for enabling
his superb 42d to reach him. In the last part
of their advance, the men of the battalion had
had to come up over ground both broken and
steep, but they traversed it with a speed which
observers admired from afar. In the land where
those Scots were bred, there are shadows of sail-
r.ATTLE OF THE ALMA. 2G1
ing cloiuls .skimming straiglit u}) tlie niouiilaiu's CIIAP.
side, and their paths are rugged, are steep, yet .^ j
their course is smooth, easy, and swift. Smooth-
ly, easily, swiftly, the ' BLack AVatcli ' seemed to
glide up the hill. A i'cw instants before, and
their tartans ranged dark in the valley — now,
their })lume3 were on the crest. The small knot
of horsemen who had ridden on before them were
still there. Any stranger looking into the group
might almost be able to know — might know by
the mere carriage of the head — that ho in the
plain, dark-coloured frock, he whose sword-belt
hung crosswise from his shoulder, was the man
tkere charged with command ; for in battle, men
who have to obey sit erect in their saddles ; he
who has on him the care of the fight seems al-
ways to fall into the pensive yet eager bend
which the Greeks— keen perceivers of truth —
used to join with their conception of ]\[ind
brought to bear upon AVar. It is on board ship,
perhaps, more commonly than ashore, that people
in peace-time have been used to ,see their fate
hanging upon the skill of one man. Often, lands-
men at sea have watched the skilled, weatherworn
sailor when he seems to look through the gale and
search deep into the home of the storm. He sees
what they cannot see ; he knows what, except
from his lips, they never will be able to learn.
They stand silent, but they question him with
their eyes. So men new to war gaze upon the
veteran commander, when, with knitted brow and
steady eyes, he measures the enemy's power, and
2G2 BATTI.K OF Tin: ALMA.
CHAP, (haws near to his fhial resulve. Caniphell, hislen-
^' iiig his eyes oii the two cohunns standing before
him, and on the heavier and more distant column
on his h^ft front, seemed not to tliiuk lightly of
the enemy's strength ; but in another instant (for
his mind was made up, and his Highland blood
took fire at the coming array of the tartans) his
features put on that glow which, seen in men of
his race— race known by the kindling grey eye,
and tlie light, stubborn crisping hair — discloses
the rapture of instant fight. Although at that
moment the 42d was alone, and was confronted
by the two columns on the farther side of the
hollow, yet Campbell, having a steadfast faith in
Colonel Cameron and in the regiment he com-
manded, resolved to go straight on, and at once,
with his ft)rward movement. lie allowed the bat-
talion to descend alone into the hollow, marching
straight against the two columns. IMoreover, he
suffered it to undertake a manoeuvre which (ex-
cept with troops of great steadiness and highly
instructed) can hardly be tried with safety again.«t
regiments still unshaken. The 'lilack Watch'
'advanced firing.'*
But whilst this fight was going on between the
4 2d and the two llussian columns, grave danger
from another quarter seemed to threaten the High-
land battalion ; for, before it had gone many
paces, Campbell saw that the column which had
• We saw that Colonel Hood with the Gieiuidier GuarJ.«
'advanced firing,' but at that moment he had already brought
the column which he attacked to the verge of its ruin.
BATTLi: OF Tin: ALMA. 263-
appeared on lii.-> left front was boldly marching chap.
forward; and such was the direction it took, ' ,
and such the nature of the ground, that the col-
umn, if it were suffered to go on with this move-
ment, would be able to strike at the flank of the
42d without having first to descend into lower
ground.
Halting the42d in tiie hollow, Campbell swiftly
measured the strength of the approaching column,
and he reckoned it so strong that he resolved to
prepare for it a front of no less than five com-
panies. He was upon the point of giving the
order for effecting this bend in the line of the 42d,
when, looking to his left rear, he saw his centre
battalion springing up to the outer crest. But
almost in the same moment he saw, or in some
way divined, that this battalion, in its exceeding
ardour for the fight, was coming up wild and
rnging. He instantly rode to his left.
The 93d in the Crimea was never quite like
other regiments, for it chanced that it had received
into its ranks a large proportion of those men of
eager spirit who had petitioned to be exchanged
from regiments left at home to regiments engaged
in the war. The exceeding fire and vehemence,
and the ever ready energies of the battalion, made
it an instrument of great might, if only it could
be duly held in, but gave it a tendency to be
headlong in its desire to hurl itself upon the
enem3\
In a minute, this fiery 93d — it was commanded
by Colonel Ainslie — came storming over the crest.
2G4 BATTLE OF TIIK AI.MA.
CUM', and, liaviii;j; now at last an enemy's column beforo
^_ it, it seenicil to be almost mad witli warlike joy.
Its formation, of course, was disturbed by the
haste and vehemence of the onset ; and Campbell
saw that, unless the regiment could be halted
and a little calmed down, it would <iO on rushinf^
ibr\\'avd in disordered fury, at the risk of shatter-
ing itself against the strength of the hard, square-
built column which was solemnly coming to
meet it.
But he who could halt his men on the bank of
a cool stream when they were rushing down to
quench the rage of their thirst, was able to quiet
them in the midst of their warlike fury. Sir
Colin got the reginrent to halt and dress its ranks.
By this time it was under the fire of the approach-
ing column.
Campljell's charger, twice wounded already,
l)ut hitherto not much hurt, was now struck by
a shot in the heart. Without a stumble or a
plunge the hoi'se sank down gently to the earth,
and was dead. Campbell took his aide-de-camp's
charger; but he had not been long in Shadwell's
saddle when up came Sir Colin's groom with his
second horse. The man, perhaps, under some
former master, had been used to be chaiged with
the 'second hor.so' in the hunting-field. At all
events, here he was ; and if Sir Colin was angered
by the apparition, he eould not deny that it was
opportune. The man touched his cap, and ex-
cused himself for being where he was. In the
dry, terse way of those Englishmen who are inucli
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 2G5
accustomed to horses he explained that towards c ii a p.
tlie rear the balls had been dropping about very '•
tliick, and that, fearing some harm might come to
his master's second horse, he had thought it best
to bring him up to the front.
AVlien the 93d had recovered the perfectness of
its ariay, it again moved forward, but at the
steady pace imposed upon it by the chief The
42d had already resumed its forward movement ;
it still advanced firing.
There are things in the world which, eluding
the resources of tlie diy narrator, can still be
faintly imagined by that subtle power which
sometimes enables mankind to picture dim truth
by fancy. According to the thought which
floated in the mind of the churchman who taneht
to All the Piussias their grand form of prayer for
victory, there are ' angels of light ' and ' angels of
' darkness and horror,' who soar over the heads of
soldiery destined to be engaged in close fight, and
attend them into battle.* When the fight grows
hot, the angels hover down near to earth with
their bright limbs twined deep in the wreaths of
the smoke which divides the combatants. But it
is no coarse, bodily help that these Christian
angels bring. More purely s})iritnal than the old
*" 'J'liis is part of the Ilussian prayer for vietory : — ' 0 Lord !
' . . . . liear us this day praying for these troojis tliat are
' gathered together. Bless and strengtlien them, and give them
' a manly lioart against their enemies. Send tliem an Angel
' of Light, and to tlie enemies an Angel of Darkness and Horror
' to scatter them, and place a stumbling-block Ijefore them to
' weaken their hearts and turn tlieir courage into llight.'
2GG liATTf.i; OF Tin: ai.ma.
CiiAi'. limnovtals, they strike no blow, they snatch no
^' man's wcajion, they lift away no warrior in a
cloud. What the angel of light can bestow is
valour, priceless valour, and light to lighten the
path to victory, giving men grace to see the bare
truth, and, seeing it, to have the mastery. To
regiments which arp to l>e blessed with victory
the Angel of Light seems to beckon, and gently
draw his men forward. What the Angel of Dark-
ness can inflict is fear, horror, despair; and it is
given him also to be able to plant error and vain
fancies in the minds of the doomed soldiery. By
false dread he scares them. Whether he who
conceived this prayer was soldier or priest, or
soldier and priest in one, it seems to me that he
knew more of the true nature of the strife of good
infantry tlian he could utter in common prose.
For indeed it is no physical pcnver which rules
the conflict between two well -formed bodies of
foot.
The mere killing and wounding which occurs
whilst a light is still hanging in doubt, does not
so alter the relative numbers of the combatants
as in that way to govern the result. The use of
the slaughter which takes place at that time lies
mainly in the stress which it puts upon the minds
of those who, themselves remaining unhurt, are
nevertheless disturbed by the sight of what is be-
falling their conn-ades. In that way, a command
of the means necessary for inflicting death and
wounds is one element of victory. But it is far
from being the chief one. Nor is it by perfect-
BATTLE OF THK ALMA. 267
ness of discipline, nor yet by a contempt of life, chap.
that men can assure to themselves the mastery ^'
over their foes. j\Iore or less all these things are
needed ; but the truly governing power is that
ascendancy of the stronger over the weaker heart
which (because of the mystery of its origin) the
churchman was willino- to ascril)e to nnirels com-
ing down from on high.
The turning moment of a fight is a moment of
trial for the soul and not for the body; and it is,
therefore, tliat such courage as men are able to
gather from being gross in numbers, can be easily
outweighed by the warlike virtue of a few. To
the stately 'Black AVatch' and the hot 93d, with
Campbell leading them on, there was vouchsafed
that stronger heart for which the brave pious
Muscovites had prayed. Over the souls of the
men in the columns there was spread, first the
gloom, then the swarm of vain delusions, and at
last the sheer horror which might be the work of
the Angel of Darkness.* The two lines marched
straight on. The three columns shook. They
were not yet subdued. They were stubborn ; but
every moment the two advancing battalions grew
nearer and nearer, and although — dimly masking
the scant numbers of the Highlanders — tliere was
still the white curtain of smoke which always rolled
on before them, yet, fitfully, and from moment to
moment, the signs of them could be traced on the
right hand and on the left in a long, shadowy line,
and their coming was ceaseless.
* See the next note.
2G8 13ATTI.K OF THE ALM.V.
CHAP. JJiit, luureover, the lliglilanJeis being iiicii of
^- great stature, and in strange garb, their plunie.s
being tall, and the view of them being broken and
distorted by the wreaths of the smoke, and there
being, too, au ominous silence in their ranks,
there were men among the liussians who began
to conceive a vague terror — the terror of things
unearthly; and some, they say, imagined tliat
they were charged by horsemen strange, silent,
monstrous, bestriding giant chargers. * The col-
mnns were falling into that plight — we have
twice before seen it this day — were falling into
that plight, that its officers were moving hither
and thither, with their drawn swords, were com-
manding, were imploring, were threatening, nay,
were even laying hands on their soldiery, and
striving to hold them fast in their places. This
struggle is the last stage but one in the agony of
a body of good infantry massed in close column.
Unless help should come from elsewhere, the
three columns would have to give way.
But help came. From the high ground on our
left another heavy colunni — the column composed
of the two right Sousdal battalions — was seen
coming down. It movt'd straight at the flank of
the 93d.
So now, for the third time that day, a mass of
infantry some fifteen hundred strong was descend-
ing upon the uncovered flank of a battalion in
* It was from the poor woiuiJed prisoners that our people
gathered the accounts of tlie impression produced upou their
niiuds by the advance of the Ilighhuiders.
BATTLE or THE ALMA. 2G9
English array; and, coming as it did from the chap,
extreme right of the enemy's position, this last '
attack was aimed almost straight at the file — the
lile of only two men — which closed tlie line of
the 93d.
But some witchcraft, the doomed men might
fancy, was causing the earth to hear giants.
Ahove the crest or swell of ground on tlie left rear
of the 93d, yet another array of tlie tall bending
])]umcs began to rise up in a long, ceaseless line,
stretching tar into the east; and presently, in
all the grace and beauty that marks a Highland
regiment when it springs up the side of a hill, the
79th came bounding forward. Without a halt, or
with only the halt that was needed for dressing
the ranks, it advanced upon the flank of the right
Sousdal column, and caught the mass in its sin —
caught it daring to march across the front of a
Highland battalion — a battalion already near, and
swiftly advancing in line. Wrapped in the fire
thus poured upon its flank, the hapless column
could not march, could not live. It broke, and Defe.it of
began to fall back in great confusion ; and the Russ'ian
left Sousdal column being almost at the same
time overthrown by the 93d, and the two columns
which had engaged the 'Black Watch' being now
in full retreat, the spurs of the hill and the wind-
ing dale beyond became thronged with the enemy's
disordered masses.
Then, again, they say, there was heard the
sorrowful wail that bursts from the heart of the
brave Russian infantry when they have to suffer
270 BATTLE OF THK ALMA.
CHAT, defeat; Imt tlii.s time tlie wail was the wail f.f
' eight Lattalioiis ; and the warlike grief of tlio
soldiery could no longer kindle the fierce intent
which, only a little before, had s})urred I'orward
the Vladimir column. Hope had lied.
After having been parted from one another by
the nature of the ground, and thus thrown for
some time into echelon, the battalions of Sir
Colin's brigade were now once more close abreast ;
and since the men looked upon ground wliere
the grey remains of the enemy's broken strengtli
were mournfully rolling away, they could not but
see that this, the revoir of the Highlanders, had
chanced in a moment of glory. Knowing their
hearts, and deeming that the time was one when
the voice of his people might fitly enough bt;
heard, the Chief touched or half lifted his hat
in the way of a man assenting. Then along the
Kourgan^ slopes, and thence west almost home to
the Causeway, the hillsides were made to resound
with that joyous, assuring cry, which is the na-
tural utterance of a northern people so long as
it is warlike and free.*
Descending into the hollow where the van-
quished troops flooded down, the waves of sound
lit upon the throng and touched it, some imag-
ined, as a breath of air touches a forest, lightly
stirring its numberless leaves. And, in truth, it
* Many of our people who had heard tlie cheers of llio
Iligldanders wore liinderod from seeing tlieni b}' the bend of
the ground, and they supposed that the cheers were uttered
in charging. It was not so, Tlic Iliglihmder.s advanced in
silence.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 271
might be lliat even in tliis the hour of turmoil chap.
I.
and defeat the long - suffering Muscovites were
stirred witli a new tliought, for tliey never before
that day had heard what our people call 'cheers ;'
and the sound is of such a kind that it startles
men not born to freedom.
The three Highland regiments were now re-
formed, and Sir Colin Campbell, careful in the
midst of victory, looked to see whether the
supports were near enough to warrant liim in
pressing the enemy's retreat with his Highland
Brigade. He judged that, since Cathcart was
still a good way off, the Highlanders ought to be
established on the ground which they had already
won ; and, never forgetting that, all this while,
he was on the extreme left of the whole infantry
array of the Allies, he made a bend in his line,
which caused it to show a front towards the
south-east as well as towards the south.
The great column of the four Ouglitz battal- stand mad*
ions was still on the rise of the hill beyond ougutz
., Til -r, „ nr^n^ battalions.
tlie hollow. It was a force some 3000 stronff.
was as yet untouched, and was glowing with
the same fire and zeal as when it had come
down in anger to support tlie attack upon Cod-
rington's brigade. From the high and command-
ing ground where the column stood posted, its
officers had been able to see and understand
the numerical proportions of the combatants
more clearly than any man could who was toil-
ing in the smoke of the fight. Looking down
from the slope, they had had to endure to see
272
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
C II A r
I.
Thr onemy's
TlPRlect of
other meas-
ures for
covering
the retreat.
the' gathered masses of tlieir iVllow - couutry-
luen giving way to the .slender lines of the red-
coats ; and nut bearing to think that their Czar
and lii.s famed infantry were to l)e coerced by
means so small and delicate, they became in-
Ihimed with indignation against their own people
for being defeated ; and presently the whole col-
umn came down the hill, undertaking nothing
less than to stay the ebb of the tide. It
thrust itself full against the retreating masses,
and angrily strove to drive them back into the
fight.*
But the Highland Brigade now again opened
fire ; and, the enemy being left very helpless, and
having no guns in battery wherewith to attempt
a stand, the Ouglitz column was ibrced to turn.-f*
It went part way up to its old ground in order
to be able to cover the retreat of the vanquished
masses.
The enemy's Ijrave and devoted inl'antiy, already
abandoned by their ordnance, were now also left
uncovered by the Kussian cavalry. That force,
nearly 3000 strong, had been so palsied by orders
or want of order.s, or by .some other unexplained
* After speaking (as shown in the former notes) of the defeat
of the Russian columns with whicli his brigade had been light-
ing, Sir Colin Campbell sa3-s that they ' were driven down into
' the valley upon a mass of troops which were placed in reserve
' on the heights in tlieir rear, and an attempt was made by tlii.s
* reserve to move in advance, forcing forward the retiring troops.'
The lis. !)}• Sir Colin Campbell, (pioted ante at page 256.
t ' But fire being again opened, this reserve returned to its
• position, evidently with a view to cover the men \\ ho had been
'driven by the three Iligliland regiments.' — Ibid.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 273
cause, that, althoufrli loii;:^ confronted by a com- chap,
paratively small body of liorse, it had not only '
abstained from all challenge, but had twice bovnc
to look upon the open flank of a slender infantry
line ascending to carry the heights without inter-
posing in the fight ; and now, M'hen the faithful
battalions might well look for charges of horse-
men to cover the retreat, the Russian cavalry still
remained idle, though it lingered for a while on
the field.*
Our cavalry, long impatient of the restraint
imposed upon it by the commander of the forces,
had crossed the river without Lord Eaglan's
authority ; and although the nature of the ford
and the upset of a gun - car li age had caused a
good deal of delay, they reached the top of the
hill soon after the Highlanders had crowned it.
With Lord Lucan's sanction, three guns of the
horse-artillery, under Captain Maude, were placed
in battery, and three guns of Captain Brandling's
troop, which came up at the time, were estab-
lished on the right of the 42d. The fire of slaughter
, . 1111 ) of tlie
these SIX guns told cruelly upon the enemy s retreatins
11 masses by
retreating masses ; and, the like being done by artuieiy.
other English batteries on the west of the Kour-
gane Hill, the slaughter was so great that, of
* At an early period of the netioii, symptoms of tlie niienter-
])risiii;f intentions of the Rnssian cavahy had been detected by
Sir George Catlicart. Being on our extreme left, he had nar-
rowly watched the enemj''s horsemen, and even before the de-
ployment of the Lst Division he had found himself able to assure
Lord liaglan tliat nothing serious was likely to be attempted by
the enemy's cavalry on the right bank of the river. This mes-
sage was carried, I think, by Captain Elliot.
VOL. III. S
274
BATl'LE OF Till'. AL^IA.
C H A r
I.
Losses sus-
tained by
the enemy
on tlie
Kourganfi
11)11:
by the
Guards ami
lliglilandeis
those who fell, very luaiiy A;ll upon their com-
rades, making in some places small banks of
slain or wounded men ; but where the round-
shot ploughed into columns still keeping some-
thing of their old coherence, there the men so
fell that there were — but I care not to speak
any more of the slaughter that is wrought by
cannon when the infantry strife is all over.
Of the four Ilussian Generals who took part
in this fight of the Kourgan^ Hill, three were
Mounded; and nearly all the field-officers, together
with very many officers of humbler grade who were
on duty with the enemy's infantry in this part of
the field, were either killed or wounded. The brave
Vladimir and the Kazan corps suffered dreadful
losses. The loss of the four Kazan battalions
alone was put at no less than seventeen hundred.*
This achievement of the Guards and the High-
land Brigade w^as so rapid, and was executed with
so steadfast a faith in the prowess of our soldiery
and the ascendancy of Line over Column, that in
vanquisliing eighteen battalions of infantry,-]- and
in going straight through with an onset which
tore open the liussian position, the six battalions
together did not lose 500 men. \
Is it then with slight loss — is it thus in a swift
* Chodasicwicz, p. 7G. The estimate was not official, and
wa.s made luuler tlie influence of the despondency created by
tlie retreat. It seems probable, therefore, that it exaggerated
the loss.
t Including the two battalions of sailors.
X The exact number seems to be -ISS, and of this loss a Inrge
proportion was occasioned by the disaster which befell the
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 275
march of a lew hundred paces on a hillside, and ciiAP.
with all this seeming ease and grace, that the last .
of the work is done whereby nation gains the
mastery over nation ?
Well, the truth is that, before it comes to a
struggle like this, a State waging war may have
to bear cruel losses — losses at sea, losses b}' pes-
tilence and famine ; losses also inflicted by the
enemy before he consents to give battle with his
infantry upon open ground ; and it might happen
to a nation to have to go through a campaign
without coming once to the strife for which her
people are fitted ; but when at last, after many an
obstacle vanquished, after many a tormenting
delay, the English array of two deep is suffered to
reach open ground, and there measures its strength
with gross columns, then the annals of our country
have taught us that, unless there be an almost
overwhelming disparity of numbers, there ought
to be no misgiving about what will be the end of
the fight.
XXXIV.
On the western slopes of the Kourgane Hill,
no step, that I know of, was taken for covering
Scots Fusilier Guards. Besides the casualties occurring to
officers, which have been mentioned elsewhere, Cust of the
Coldstream and Abercrombie of the 93d were killed, and Baring
of the Coldstream was wounded. Cust was a man so much be-
loved b}' his friends, that when I was going to the Crimea in
1869 several of them abked me to try to find his grave. I
found it ; and a lovelier grave there could not be. It was on
the right bank of the Alma, and richly overgrown with * the
' flowers of the field.'
f
276 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, tlie witlidrawal of the defeated troops ; and if in
^' the minds of liussian oificers in tliat part of the
field there yet remained any notion of trying to
govern the retreat, their last hope was blasted
by the new and ominons sign which then started
Thegciriot full into viow. On the fatal knoll, whence evil
knoll?" ' seemed alwaj's to come to the army of the Czar,
there took place a sudden change. The horse-
men with the white plumes were qnite suddenly
withdrawn fro;p. .sight, and in a minute the knoll
was surmounted with a scarlet arch. The arcli
was an arch built of Eiiglisli troops ranged in line
across the summit, and thence on either side
stretching down the steep shoulders of the knoll.
And this arch of formed troops rose up in the
heart of what had been the liussian position.
Moreover, it faced towards the south-cast, plainly
showing that it was in the mind of the red-
coats to cross the higher part of the Pass, and
spring upon the flank of the troops which were
retiring along the Great Causeway.
Then, peihaps, if not long before, the most
hopeful of the Russian officers wlio looked fn)ni
the Pass or from the western slopes of the Koin--
gan^ Hill, would be constrained to acknowledge
that their army had fallen under the mastery of
that gracious-looking horseman long seen on the
knoll, who managed his charger and his field-glass
with one hand and a half-empty sleeve. And,
indeed, the mastery was now so complete that
to any poor jNIuscovitc soldier who M-as simply
moving from the field with all the speed he had,
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 277
Lis officers could hardly say with truth that they cilAP.
had any better tactics to show him.
It will be remembered that when Lord Eaglan,
after crossing the river, gained his first joyful
glimpse of the knoll, he ordered up Adams's
brigade in all haste. The force obeying this
order comprised two battalions, the 41st under
Colonel Carpenter, and the 49tli under Major
Daltou.* These troops encountered some trouble
in passing the river, but were keenly urged
forward ; and the moment they gained the sum-
mit of the knoll, Lord Eaglan, with his own eye
and voice, caused them to be drawn up in line.
In order to make way for them on the top, the
Headquarter Staff moved aside, and Lord Eaglan
so placed the line that it fronted towards the
south-east.
If the battle at this time had been hanging in
doubt, Lord Eaglan, placed as he was with these
two battalions in his hand, could hardly have
failed to make them the means of governing the
result, for their advance would have threatened
to roll up the enemy's line from its centre to its
extreme right. As it was, the force became
that scarlet bow on the knoll which seemed to
present to the enemy the alternative of sheer
flight or captivity.
Lord Eaglan, however, perceived that the
cogency with which these battalions would act
in hurrying the retreat, depended rather upon
* The 47tli, as we saw, remained under the personal directio:n
of Evans, and crossed the river when he did.
278
BATTLE OF TIIH AL5IA.
Cll Al'.
I.
llieir mere appearance on thi.s part of llie ficlJ
than upon any real power that they had of
intercepting the enemy ; for though the enemy
might judge them to be very near, they were
parted from liim by deep hollows, and it was
plain that if they were moved forward before
the knowledge of their presence had sufficiently
spread, they would in a great measure lose their
weight ; because in crossing the hollow which
divided them from the line of the retreat, they
would necessarily drop out of sight. So, in
order that the aspect of the force might sink into
the enemy's heart, Lord IJaglan kept it formed
upon the sunnnit of the knoll for two or three
minutes. He then moved it towards the south-
east. General Eyre at nearly this time advanced
by the line of the Causeway with one of Sir
Itichard England's brigades.
The column of the Ouglitz battalions began to
fall back ; and thenceforth there remained no
part of the Russian army in this part of the field
which was not in full retreat.
The guns of Turner's battery were limbered
up and pushed forward to a commanding spot
further up in the Pass, and thence, at long
range, they continued to pour their fire upon
tlie enemy's retreating troops. In the perform-
ance of this duty they were aided by a French
Final opera- battery. Aftcrwards Lord Eaglan sent an aide-
aniiiery. dc-camp with orders to cause tlie guns to advance
to a more commanding ground which he had ob-
served on their left front. The English battery
Retreat of
the last
Russian
biittalions,
which liad
hitherto
Btood tlair
ground.
BATTLb: OF TIIH ALMA. 279
advanced accordingly; but the officers in com- chap.
niand of the French battery declined to move ^'
forward. It was at this time that Walsham was Their lossea
killed. He was the last officer who fell that day.
Besides Walsham, our artillery corps lost two
officers killed — namely, Dew and Cockrell; and
of the rank and file, nine were killed, and twenty
(besides one sergeant) were wounded.
XXXV.
Lord Eaglan now descended from the knoll Lord Ragian
whither Fortune, in her wild and puissant gov- causeway T
ernance of human events, had happily chosen to
lead him. Bending his steps towards the ground
just won by the Duke of Cambridge's Division,
he rode across the main Causeway.
At that very time, as I make it, there was riding
towards Lord Eaglan, and riding, too, along the
same road, though at a distance of some few
hundred yards, a man, confounded and troubled,
who had helped to bring great avoc on his
country.*
Clearly wanting in manv, nay, perhaps, in Pnuce
„, ... T-i"^ 1 Meiitsclii-
most, ot the qualities which make an able com- kofrou
ground not
mander, Prince Mentschikoff was still a brave farotr:
* The General who describes his interview with Prince Ment-
schikoff tells us what was the state of the battle at the time
when the meeting took place : and it seems to me that that
stage was the very one that the battle had reached when Lord
Kaglau crossed the great road. If so, it follows of course that
the two facts occurred simnltaneously.
280 BATTLE OF THE ALM.V.
CHAP. man. It coukl not but be that bis beavt was
\ in tliG cause. A momentous battle had been
raffing. Of one of the contending armies lie
was the Commander-in-Chief. He was in full
health. He yearned to be acting : yet from the
moment when he entrusted to Kiriakoff the
great column of the eight battalions, his mind
had given no impress to events.
The part lie In ovdcr to 866 how tliis camc to be possible,
taking ill it must bc remembered, first, that the tract of
ground over which Prince Mentschikoff watched
was somewhat broad ; and, secondly, that all
the decisive fighting of that day was condensed
into a narrow period of time. The Allies had
been advancing upon a front of five miles ; and
all the fights in which the combatants had en-
gaged with their ranged battalions took place,
as I reckon it, within a period of some thirty-
five minutes. Now, if any man used to the
saddle, and acquainted also Mith a country
of open downs much divided by hollows and
ravines, will fasten his mind upon any t^^■o
hill-tops or other landmarks which he knows
to be five miles asunder, and will then imagine
a number of brief events to be happening, first
in one part of this extended tract and then in
another, but all within little more than half an
hour, he will be able to understand how it might
be possible for the Russian General to be eagerly
riding from east to west and from west to east,
yet always being so luckless as never once to
strike in upon the ground wdiere the event that
BATTLE OF THE ALMA, 281
lie yearued to witness and to control was swiftly chap.
passing. It w^as not, I am sure, from any neglect .___J
or delinquency that Prince Mentschikoff came to
be annulled during all the lieavy stress of the
battle.
We left the Prince handing over to Kiriakoff
the charge of the great column of tlie eight
battalions, and it is only by conjecture that
I can form an idea of wliat became of him dur-
ing the critical period of several minutes which
then immediately followed. He would not have
abandoned the personal command of the column
which he had eagerly gathered together for
a great enterprise, unless he had been dragged
away by tidings of what was happening in the
I'^nglish part of tlie iield. Thither, therefore, he
would ride, and he would ride, no doubt, witli the
knowledge (for that was what his last tidings must
have taught him) that the English had stormed and
carried the Great Piedoubt. But he would have
to cross the great road, and before he got thither
he would see — and would see, one may imagine,
with unspeakable astonishment — that the Volhy-
nia columns then constituting what remained
of his ' great reserves ' were no longer in their
place. Finding that they were retiring, or had
already retired, and knowing nothing of the way
in which Lord Eaglan had driven them from the
field by the use of his two guns on the knoll,
the Prince would be likely to ride in the direc-
tion which the reserve columns took, very eager
to find some man upon whom to vent his anger.
282 BATTU: OF THE ALMA.
CiiAP. The minutes it took him to ride alter the reserves
' to seek out the cause of tlieir retreat, and to come
back to the front, would be those very minutes
in which the position held by the centre and the
right of the llussian army was falling into the
hands of the English.
hisie- Tliis, I repeat, is only a conjectural mode of
in the Eiig- filling tlic chasui which is left open bv the llus-
lisli part of . ° , , , , " -n. •
thefitid. siau narrators; but the spot wiiere the 1 rince is
found when he reappears in the eye of History,
is exactly the one in which those who adopt my
surmise would expect to see him riding. For it
was by the great road, where his reserves had
been posted, that Prince MentschikofF came back
into that part of the field with which the Eng-
lish had dealt. When last he saw it, the posi-
tion, immensely strong by nature, was held in the
grip of powerful batteries, and battalions stand-
ing ri'dd as granite. Since that time, it is true,
some hours had passed, but it was only a few
minutes before that he had been the assailant
in the other part of the field, placing a migiity
column in the hands of Kiriakoff with orders to
make an onslaught upon Canrobert's Division.
Now — he gazed, and gazed again, being slow to
understand — being slow to let in the belief — that
the grey, rolling masses which approached him
were the ruins of two - thirds of his army. But
presently he came upon a sight hardly less
strange, hardly less shocking to him, than his
iHsmeeUng retreating soldiery. He met on the road a
with Gorta- . , »• i n •
chikotr:^ lone man — a lone man on toot, walking away
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 283
from the field. lie looked, and came lo make chap.
out that this loiie pedestrian was Prince Gort- '
schakoff — Prince Gortschakoff, the chief to whom
he had entrusted the command of tlie whole
centre and the whole right wing of his army.
' What is this ? ' ' What is the matter ? ' ' Why
' are you on foot ? ' ' Why are you alone ? '
These, as was natural, were the questions hurled
at Prince Gortschakoff by his troubled, amazed
commander. ' My horse,' said Gortschakoff, ' was
' killed near the river. I am alone, because all
' the aides-de-camp and officers of ni}' Staff have
' been killed or wounded. I have received six
' shots ; ' and then, in a spirit scarce worthy
of historic moments, scarce matching with the
greatness of the disaster which his overthrow
had brought upon a proud and mighty empire.
Prince Gortschakoff showed the rents which shot
had made in his clothes.*
At this time, so far as I know. Prince Ment- hisomis-
schikoff used none of the means by which, measures for
though forced to retreat, skilled commanders retreat:
can make themselves feared. On the very road
where he stood, the Czar's faithful infantry —
infantry famous for its heroism in the trying
hour of a retreat — was left to extricate itself
from the field by brute flight. It would seem
that Prince JMentschikoff's authority — already
for some time neutralised by the mischances
which, all the day long, had been throwing him
* It is Prince Gortschakoff himself who gives this account of
his meeting with Prince Mentschikoff.
284 BATTLE OF TllK ALMA.
CHAP, into tlio wvuiil;- part (iT tlic licld — now slipped
• from out of his hands. lie had no longer a
he is carried gvasp of his ai'inv. A little later, he was seen
the retreat- bomc along witli tlic el)b, a dismal unit in the
ing masses -i-vi t • -i i-i • • , ^ ^
throng. Lndued with a high spirit, and having
a good deal of the pride which a man may justly
take in his country so long as it is warlike and
honest, he broke out into a loud, angry cry.
' It is a disgrace,' he said, ' for a Paissian soldier
* to retreat ! ' An officer, heaiing his words, and
being maddened, partly by the defeat, and partly,
as they say, by strong drink, fiercely answered
his General, and told him to his face, in the
hearing of the soldiery, that if he had ordered
the men to stand, they would have held their
ground.* To this depth of wretchedness Prince
Mentschikoff fell in the nineteenth month from
the time when, in the name of a mighty empire,
and under the gaze of all Europe, he came down
iuto the Bospliorus with commission to trample
upon the Ottoman State.
XXXYI.
Tiie array of jMeaiitimc Evaus had been rc^"uined by the two
annyonthe rcgiments dctaclied under Adams. The Scots
(.'round tliey in- i • i
iiiidwou. lusiliers had resumed their place in tlie centre
of the brigade of Guards. The Light Division,
re-formed, had followed the advance of the Duke
of Cambridge. Sir Eichard England, pushing
forward towards his right front, had taken up
* Chodasiewicz.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 285
ground ou one of the eastern spurs of tlie Tele- chap.
graph Pleight. At tlie opposite extremity of our ^'
line, Sir George Cathcart had established liis
troops on the left rear of the Higliland Brigade.
Facing ahnost due south, and puslied forward to
the reverse of the slopes which made the strength
of the Russian position, and ranged upon a front
of two miles, the British infantry looked down
upon the enemy's retreating masses.
At this time Lord Eaglan sent the Adjutant- oi.oiati.ms
General with his orders to the cavalry. Those Li, cavalfy.
orders, however, did not authorise tlic operations
by which it is usual for horsemen to gatJier in
tlie fruits of a victory. A commander, even in
battle, must not forget the campaign. The West-
ern Powers were invading a province of Bussia
witli forces wliich liad to march througli an open
country. Their pretension to wage sucli war as
tliat depended upon their having at tlieir command
all the three arms of the service ; therefore the
strength of the arm in which they were the most
weak was the measure of their power as invaders.
The French, as we saw, liad no cavalry, and tlie
English had rather more than a thousand sabres
and lances. With such a force, thrown forward
to intercept the enemy's retreating masses, man}^
prisoners, if not also some guns, might have
been assuredly taken ; and it was to be ex-
pected that blows of this kind would aggravate
the despondency of the beaten army. But Loicl
Eaglan judged that no practicable capture of
trophies or prisoners was worth the risk of los-
286 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, ing a material part of his small brilliant cavalry
' force. He therefore declined to let his horse-
men push forward without the support of a
powerful artillery ; and the orders he sent by
the Adjutant-General directed that the cavalry
should escort the foot-batteries to the front. In
delivering this instruction, Estcourt cautioned
Lord Lucan, and told liiin ' that tlic cavalry were
' not to attack.'
Lord Cardigan, with one-half of the cavalry
force, was directed to escort the guns which
were to go to the right, whilst Lord Lucan in
person went forward with the rest of the cavalry,
and escorted the guns advancing on our left.
Lord Lucan, riding in advance of tlie guns wnth a
squadron of the 17th Lancers, came upon many of
the enemy's stragglers in retreat, and he ordered
the horsemen who were with him, supported
by another squadron, to pursue and take prison-
ers. A troop of the lllli Hussars had been
ordered (it was said by Lord Raglan himself)
to do the same thing, and tlie 17th had already
taken a great many prisoners, when the operation
was stopped by special orders from Lord Rag-
lan. What Lord Ivaglan had meant was, that the
troopers employed in taking prisoners should be
spread out as skirmishers ; and when he saw that
they were acting in serried ranks, and were going
on far in advance, he became anxious lest some
of the enemy's guns should be brought to bear
upon them, and occasi(Ui him a loss in that one
description of force witli which the Allies were
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 287
scantily provided. He therefore sent first one chap,
and then another Staff officer to the commander '
of the cavalry, with orders to give up the pursuit
of prisoners, and return to the duty of escorting
the guns. Thereupon, Lord Lucan recalled the
troopers in advance, and the prisoners they had
taken were set free.
XXXVIl.
It will be remembered that at the time when Piogress of
the head of the first French Division was pushed artniery-
back by the 'great column of the eight battalions,' thepiateaa
General Canrobert was still witliout his artillery, to east.
But these batteries having been sent down to
Almatamack, and having there crossed the river,
had at last been brought up to the plateau, and
(along with some guns belonging to Bosquet's
Division) they were now travelling eastward.
In the part of the field where Bosquet stood,
and from which this long train of artillery had
commenced its eastward journey, there was no
enemy at hand ; and even when the guns had
come to within a short distance of the ground
in front of Canrobert's right wing, there was no
Taissian battalion which could be seen by the
French artillerymen ; for the train was moving
along a hollow which, so long as a man rode low
down, was deep enough to hinder him from see-
ing far either on his right hand or on his left.
But some of the officers who were with the guns
now thought it was time to obtain a M'idcr view
288 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, of tlic oroiiud, and they therefore rode part way
^' up the slope which overhung tlie ravine towards
descrying ^hcir right. Before they had yet got quite up to
'ofth°S" ^^^^ ^^^ ground above the ravine, they suddenly
'^*^^""'"-' stopped ; for, monstrous, immense, and obtruded
before them on the plateau, at a. distance of only
a few hundred yards, they saw a grey, oblong-cut
block — saw what in one moment they knew to bo
a mass of liussian infantry — a mass of unwonted
size — standing rigidly built in clo^^e column.
This was the great 'column of the eight battal-
' ions' — the dumb, gliding phantasm of the Tele-
graph Ileiglit, whose bare aspect had given strange
speed to the breathless French aide-de-camp on the
knoll, and had just been constraining the head
of Canrobert's Division to fall back, and drop
imder the crest. With that warlike swiftness
of thought which is natural to the French in
the hour of battle, the officers who caught sight
of this apparition darted straight upon the per-
ception of what ought to be done. Some of the
guns were brought up to a part of the slope from
which, without being easily seen, they could throw
their fire into the column.*
Tiic column Suddenly Kiriakoff found that his close mass
torn by ar- . , ,
tiiiery-iire: of eight battalious was cruclly rent by shot and
shell coming from the west. Without stopping
to find out by calm scrutiny the quarter wlience
the fire really came, Iviiiakoff hastily accepted
* See tlie Plan. It is taken from a Kketch which was made
for me by a French officer who was present with the artillery
thus brought to bear on the column.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 289
the belief that it came from the sea ; and in order chap.
to place his troops out of the reach of the ships, '
he began to move off his column in an inland or
easterly direction, taking nearly the same route as
that by which he had advanced.* Whilst he thus and moved
marched, shot and shells continued to cut their Kiriakoff.
way into the midst of his hapless column, inflict-
ing a dreadful slaughter. This trial — the trial of
men who have to march under a shattering fire
without being able to strike one blow at their
slayers — was borne by the Eussian soldiery with
a great fortitude. Order was maintained ; and,
torn as it was from moment to moment, the col- its de-
ineanoui
umn marched grandly. Along with the column
there were two batteries ; but, far from helping to
cover its retreat, these guns were suffered to be-
come a burthen ; for, several of the horses having
been wounded or killed, the task of dragging off
the cannon was thrown upon soldiers. It would
seem, however, that the natural awe with which
Canrobert's troops had looked upon the advance
of the huge column was not lifted off from their
minds when first they saw it withdrawing, for
no French infantry moved forward to press the
retreat of the eight battalions. 'The French,'
* My knowledge of the exact way in which these guns were
brought to bear upon the hapless column is derived from a
French officer who was present with the guns, and who took
part in seizing the occasion which was i)resented by the sudden
discovery of the column. With respect to a statement at one
time put forward — a statement that ' the colunm of the eiglit
' battalions' had been defeated by infantry, see No. VIII. of
the Appendix.
VOL. in. X
2y0 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, says Kiriakoff, * did not follow us. I am ignorant
! ' of the reason why. Maybe they did not want
on ule%ht ' to stand between the fire of their ships and our
Tdegiajlif: ' regiments ; maybe the sight of the two bodies of
' Hussars, headed by Colonel AVailinovich, may
' have checked them.* In fact, I cannot explain
' their conduct.' By pursuing his easterly march
for some time, Kiriakoff brought his column out
of the artillery-fire which had been tearing it, and
he came at last to a halt upon a spot on the right
the part rear of the Telegraph. Although it was the des-
it had taken i> ^ • ■, pi -tiit j^
in the battle, tiuy 01 tlus ' columu 01 the eight battalions to
be able to put a great stress upon the French
army, and afterwards to be cruelly shattered by
cannon, yet, from first to last, the body which
thus did and thus suffered was without an oc-
casion for firing a shot.
XXXVIII.
A flanking Moved froui wcst to cast along the top of the
the French platcau, the Trcnch guns, which had dealt with
poured upon tlie columu, wcrc uow oucc morc in battery, and
on the upon Giround from which they threw a flanking
Telpgrai'h i o -J _ ■="
Hoigtit fire in the direction of the troops which still
remained on the slopes in front of the Telegraph
Height. The only infantry forces which had
been placed in that part of the field were the four
* The translation I liave used says 'annoyed them,' but I
gather from the context tliat the word I have ventured to sub-
stitute more acc-arately represents the General's meaning.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 291
Taroutine and the four ' Militia ' battalions ; but, chap.
supposing that the breaking-up of the ' Militia ' ^'
battalions was by this time virtually complete,
Kiriakoff had no infantry on the whole Telegraph
Height except the four Taroutine battalions, and
the stricken, the bleeding column which he had
just withdrawn from the front. Yet at this time, condition
though Kiriakoff evidently did not know of the L tbLt%rt
proximity of many of the French battalions which
were hanging back close under the plateau, there
were in reality some thirty thousand Frenchmen
and Turks standing on ground from which, in a
period of only a few minutes, they might close in
both upon his front and his left flank. Without
apprehending the extent to which he was encom-
passed, Kiriakoff came to see that the troops he
had in front of the Telegraph must not be left
standing under a cross-fire of artillery. He had
not in his own hands the means of repelling or
silencing the guns which were pouring their fire
from the west along the summit of the plateau ; The result
and being without orders, and even, it seems, Kiriakoff
without tidings, he tried to find a clue for the oiaservedin
guidance of his conduct by learning the course partoAiie
which the battle was taking in the English part
of the field. Hitherto his glances in that direction
had brought him no comfort. Even so early as
the time when he pushed back the head of Can-
robert's Division, he had found that the English
were gaining the ascendancy over the centre and
right wing of the Russians. 'When,' he writes —
• when the first success of the enemy had been
292
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, 'stopped on the left wing, in the centre* and
; ' the right wing * the turn of affairs was begiu-
* ning to be against us. I cannot judge the
' particulars of that part of the battle, being fully
' occupied by doing my own duty, and I could
' not observe as well the events on my right ;
' but thus far I could see, that the enemy had
' taken up a strong position on the left bank of
' the Alma.' This, at the moment of his success
against Canrobert, had been Kiriakoff's percep-
tion of the course which events were taking in
his convic- the English part of the field ; and now, when he
tilatiiart'" lookcd oucc morc to where the red-coats were
the Kiit,'iish moving, he saw that in that part of the field the
iie battle: battle was lost to the Czar. He saw not only
that the Causeway batteries had been withdrawn,
and that upon their site English regiments were
established (apparently he had seen that before •!•),
but that Mentschikoff' s infantry reserves were in
retreat ; and that, looking eastward along the
Eussian side of the river as far as his eye could
reach, he was unable to see the end of the slender
red line which marked the advance of tlie Eng-
lish. Even if he did not observe or understand
the ominous silence of the Great Eedoubt, he
could not fail to see that the withdrawal of the
Causeway batteries, and of the infantry reserves,
was not only an abandonment of the great ' position
* i.e., those portions of the Bussian army which were opposed
to the English.
t "When he said that the English 'had taken up a strong
' position on the left' [i. e., the Russian] 'bank of the river.'
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 293
' on the Alma,' but was also a retreat with whicli chap.
it was his obvious duty to conform. For that ^-
reason he first ordered his troops to retire to a
part of the Great Post-road which lay on the
right rear of his position ; and when he got to
that spot, he found that the victory won by Lord ],« onnforms
Raglan was by that time so well assured as to IncliroT""'
oblige him to continue his retrograde march, and rp'tre.atrirg
conform at once to the movements of the seven- EngiTsh!'*'
and-twenty battalions then yielding to their Eng-
lish assailants.
' Impossible,' writes Kiriakoff, after speaking of
the direction in which French artillery had been
brought to bear upon his troops in front of the
Telegraph — ' impossible to leave the left wing
' thus exposed to a cross-fire, and I could not send
' or wait for orders from the Commander-in-Chief.
' The right wing* having already begun a very deci-
' sive movement of retreat, I commanded the march
' towards the main road, on either side of which
' I ranged the troops. This road was beyond the
' height where our principal reserves had stood.
' Then I became aware that our right wing * was
' indeed retreating ; and, wishing to conform as
' much as possible with their movements, I
' ordered a second march towards a height be-
' yond the road.-f- . . . The enemy did not
' follow us.'
* i.e., troops opposed to the English.
+ If full faith be given to this testimony of Kiriakoff, it is of
course conclusive of the question as to where the Russian re-
treat began ; for he speaks as an eyewitness of the retreat which
294
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP.
I.
His retreAt
not molested
by French
infantry:
KiriakofiTs
artillery.
In their retreat the Taroutine battalions — the
troops which marched in what was then the rear
of Kiriakoff' s force — were plied with the fire of
cannon, but were not at all vexed by French
infantry.*
General Kiriakoff' s retreating artillerymen were
not called upon to fend off a pursuit, but they
seized what they judged an apt moment for facing
about to plant some guns in battery, and we shall
presently witness their lire reaching back to the
Telegraph Height.
had taken place in front of tlic English, and he was the actual
ordainer of the reti'ograde movement which he deemed to he
the necessary consequence of the defeat which his countrymen
had sustained at the hands of our people. It may he said that
it was for his interest to make this statement, and that there-
fore he is not an impartial witness. This is true : but, lesides
that his character for honour and high spirit places him above
the suspicion of gross and intentional misstatement, it happens
that his account is corroborated in the most distinct terms
by AnitchkofT, an apparently impartial narrator. Anitchkoff,
when he wrote, was an officer on the General Staff of the Rus-
sian army, writing under circumstances which gave him con-
siderable means of knowing tlie truth, and which made it his
duty to hold the balance eveidy between GortschakofT, Kiria-
koff, and Kvetzinski ; yet in clear words he corroborates Kiria-
koff. After speaking of the centre and right wing of the Rus-
sians— the troops with which the English had been dealing —
and of their retreat ' to the former position two versts to the
' south,' he adds immediately these words : ' Whither they
' were ' [remark the word presently coming] ' whither they were
' followA by the left wing, who had withstood and repelled the
' attack of the whole of the four French Divisions until the
' moment of the general retreat. '
* Chodasiewicz. This writer was a field-officer in the Tar-
outine corps, and his statements (almost all of them valuable)
ere an excellent authority in all that relates to the operations
of his own regiment
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 296
XXXIX.
Wlieu Kiriakofi's battalions liad withdrawn, ciiAi\
Canrobert's Division and D'Anrelle's brigade — ^-
that brigade followed close by Prince Napoleon Great con-
° . -^ ^ flux of
— moved straight npon the Teleoraph. It was ^iench
o I o i troops to
whilst our Grenadier Guards in a distant part "■Y'^sthe
of the field were stepping up from the river's
bank to engage the enemy in their front, that this
advance of the French took place.* The two
Zouave Eegiments (which stood, as we know,
side by side on the left front of Canrobert's force),
and, almost at the same moment, the 39th regi-
ment of the line — the regiment which formed the
head of D'Aurelle's column — pushed swiftly for-
ward towards the Telegraph. These troops for a capture of
tli6 Tclc-
while continued to be sheltered by the steepness graph.
of the hill they were ascending, but upon gaining
its crest, the heads of their columns incurred the
artillery fire hurled back, as we saw, from the
ground to which Kiriakoff's force had retreated ;
and on closely approaching the Telegraph, they
all at once came on some riflemen whom the
enemy, when about to move off, had neglected to
withdraw from the spot ; + but, undaunted by the
* Sir Thomas Troubridge of the Royal Fusiliers saw both the
movements, and marked that they took place simultaneonsly.
+ It is not with the gallant French ar7ny that the construc-
tion of warlike fables originate. The record of this encounter,
by one of the gallant Zouave officers who took part in it, states
these Russian Riflemen found at the Telegi-aph to be a force
consisting of 'two companies.' See footnote post in which the
passage is given. In each Russian battalion there were twenty-
ibur men armed with rifles; and founding myself partly upon
296 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, cannonade which thus greeted them, and over-
' whelming the helpless riflemen — not without a
free use of the bayonet — the French masses con-
tinued tlieir onset; and three agile soldiers run-
ning forward in advance of their comrades, reared
the colours of their three several regiments on the
stump of the unfinished pillar, or the scaffolding
M'hich surrounded its sides. Whilst in the very-
act of thus planting the standard of his regiment,
Lieutenant Poitevin of the 39th Eegiment was
struck dead by a cannon-ball, and a grape-shot
killed Serjeant Fleury of the 1st Eegiment of
Zouaves, the flag-staff supporting its colours being
also at the same time broken by a fragment of
shell.*
Nature of So, the substaucc of what here occurred was
at"t.he TciL the Converging onset of thousands of high-mettled
^^^ '" soldiery springing forward to reach the goal with-
out suffering themselves to be daunted by a pelt-
ing fire of artillery ; and their merit, one need
hardly say, was neither augmented nor lessened by
the recollection of a conversation on this subject ■with General
do Todleben, I am led to conjectiire that the Riflemen found at
the Telegraph belonged all to the ' Minsk ' regiment, which,
out of its four battalions, might have furnished as many as
ninety-six Riflemen.
* The military reader will not fail to observe that all the
above-mentioned missiles, 'round-shot,' 'grape,' and 'fragment
' of shell,' were of the kind discharged only by artUlery, and
will see how far that circumstance goes towards negativing the
supposition that the Russians were intentionally making a
stand with infantry on the summit of the Tek'gra])h Height.
The hapless riflemen, plainly left by mistake at the Telegraph,
must have suffiTcd under the artillery fire directed upon that
part of the ground by their own fcllow-countrym'Bn.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 297
the presence of the few hapless riflemen whom chap,
they found left behind — left behind, we may infer, '
by mistake — on ground near the foot of the
Telegraph.
Still, there yet remained the fact that some
Eussian foot-soldiers, however few, and whether
owing or not to mistake, had been left behind
and exposed to the fate of being overwhelmed and
bayoneted when tlie French came up thronging
ipon them ; and accordingly their presence at the
Telegraph, when conjoined with the other occur-
rences which we saw attending its capture, be-
came the evident basis, or rather the sound part
of the basis, on which the story of an arduous
fight between French and Eussian infantry was
some time afterwards built.
The other part of the basis on which the fable long
rested was unsound, it is true, but still specious.
When soldiers in battle break loose from the
guidance of their commanders, they so feel the
need of a purpose, that a tree, a house, or a wind-
mill— any object, in short, which stands out plain
in the landscape — may have power to draw them
towards it ; and if a conflux like this lias once
set in, the eddy soon begins to run strong. First
three or four eager and venturous men, then clus-
ters, then scores, then hundreds, rushed panting
for the goal that they saw in the conspicuous pil-
lar on the Telegraph, now surmounted with flags ; Turmoil
and soon, thousands and thousands of vehement Teiegrapi
soldiery were thronging from many quarters upon ^®'^^"~
this single point. There could not but be a great
298 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, turmoil, and there is reason to fear that, witli the
^- shouts of the victors, there mingled the voices of
the hapless riflemen crying vainly for quarter;
and although the Eussian guns were withdrawn,
French batteries, pursuing with fire, still main-
tained the roar of artillery. With such sights and
sounds to guide them, observers might easily im-
agine that the Telegraph Height was the theatre
of a struggle which must include in its area
the clash of hostile battalions ; but, as from the
battle-field itself, so also from the imaginations of
men brooding over it, the smoke after some time
was lifted ; and for that assemblage of facts which
was needed to constitute a real infantry fight, one
essential ingredient proved wanting. No Rus-
sian battalion was present ; and accordingly the im-
petuous Zouaves, no less than their more gentle
comrades of the line, were precluded by sheer
want of opponents* from the means of engaging
* So far as concerned the notion of a serious fight at the
Telegraph itself, I find that I might have averted the con-
troversy to which the above statement gave rise. In the
'Souvenirs d'un officier du 2'"'= Zouaves,' published in 1859,
the 'opponents' are thus estimated: — 'The 1st Regiment of
' Zouaves operates the same movement ; tlie two regiments '
[i.e., the 1st and 2d Zouaves, which had together a strength of
about 3000— they kept a strengtli of no less than 27G8 even so
late as the following November] ' arrive at the foot of the
' tower, of which they take possession, notwithstanding the
' resistance of two companies of sharpshooters armed with large
' rifles,' pp. 144, 145. Considering that the Zouaves were 3000,
followed close by many thousands more of French troops, and
that the Russians attempting to obstruct them were estimated
iij their as.'iailanls at 'two companies,' it will hardly be denied
any more tliat there was that 'sheer want of opponents' which
is suggested iu the text. — Note to 5th Edition.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 299
in that desperate strife of infantry against infantry chap.
which, under the description of ' the combat at the '
' Telegraph,' has found a place in French annals.*
At length the state of the smoke allowed men
to see that no Russian battalion was near. Then
the close of what resembled a fight was joyfully
hailed as a victory.
From the time when the bulk of the French Marshal
advanced to the banks of the river, Marshal St
Arnaud had placed himself in the midst of Prince
Napoleon's battalions ; and, the Prince's Division
having been kept low down in the bottom dur-
ing the critical period of the battle, it must have
been hard for a man who remained jammed down
with those troops to obtain a fair view of what
was going on ; f but tlie Marshal, it seems, now
galloped up to the Telegraph, and sharing, no
doubt, in the belief that there had been a hot
fight there, and inferring also that the fight had
been won by the thousands of eager Zouaves whom
he saw thronging round the pillar, he turned, it is
said, to these his most trusted soldiery, and said
to them, ' I thank you, my Zouaves ! '
Canrobert's and Prince Napoleon's Divisions,
with D'Aurelle's brigade betwixt them, were then
massed about the Telegraph upon a very small
space of ground.
* Tlio narratives which French historians have given of this
supposed fight, together with my reasons for excluding tlieir
stories from my text, will he found in the Appendix. — Note to
\st Edition.
+ See the Plan (taken from the ' Atlas Historique '), which
shows the Marshal's position.
300
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP.
L
Opportunity
of cuttinj;
off some of
the enemy's
retreating
masses.
Vain endea-
vours of
Lord Raglan
and of Airey
to cause the
requisite
advance of
French
troops.
XL.
At this time, two messengers came in liaslo
from different parts of the English field of battle :
they both came with the same object. The first
of these was an aide-de-camp sent straight from
Lord Raglan to the nearest French troops he
could find ; the other was Colonel Steele, who
came charged with the request which General
Airey from another part of the field had taken
upon himself to address to Marshal St Arnaud.
Whilst the Russian battalions were retreating be-
fore the English infantry, Lord Raglan in one part
of the field, and General Airey in another, had,
almost at the same moment, observed the same
opportunity, and fastened upon the same mode
of seizing it. Each of them had seen that masses
of the retreating infantry were moving in such a
direction, and through a gorge which so straitened
their movements, that their retreat could be cut
off or turned into a ruinous disaster by the im-
mediate advance of a few battalions pushing for-
ward from the left of the French line, and bearing
towards the great road.
When Lord Raglan's aide-de-camp reached the
Telegraph, he found that the troops he came upon
had just halted two hundred yards in front of
the building, and that the column with which he
sought to find the Prince was under a good deal
of excitement. Used to the silence of English
troops, the aide-de-camp was a good deal struck
with the effect produced by thousands of soldiers
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 301
ill heavy masses talking all at the same time. chap.
The aide-(le-canip was accompanied by Vico, the
French Commissioner accredited to the English
Headquarters. Vico conveyed Lord Eaglan's
wishes to the General commanding the brigade,
and was told in answer that the troops would
advance. This, however, they did not do.
The similar request which Colonel Steele ad-
dressed to St Arnaud was met by a refusal. The
jNIarshal excused himself for declining to advance
by saying that his troops had left their knapsacks
in the valley below.
Marslial St Arnaud was able to remain all day st Arnaud.
Dn horseback ; and it does not appear that the to which"
state of his health at this time was such as to was brought
hinder him from using his intellectual powers ; the battle.
but he did not place himself in a part of the field
from which a general could hope to be able to
govern events; and from the time when he dis-
patched his ill-devised orders to the 4th Division,
I have not been able to perceive that his mind at
all touched the battle.
XLI.
General Foray, perhaps, had hoped that in the xiie ground
presence of the enemy he might be able to cover For^^vith
over the mark which his reputation contracted on brig.aae.
the 2d of December — on the day when, along with
Maupas's commissaries of police, he suffered him-
self to be publicly used as the assailant and the
jailer of the unarmed legislature of France ; but if
the French
army
302 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, by chance this man shall be brought some day to
^- his account, it will not be by an appeal to the
memory of the Alma that lie will be able to avert
his punishment. With Lourmel's brigade, as we
saw, he had followed the steps of Bouat, marching
off to the peaceful sea-shore, and becoming null in
Position the battle. When D'Aurelle was already at the
l^eTesTof^ Telegraph, Forey, with Lourmel's brigade, had but
just crossed the river at its very mouth, and was
more than two miles distant from the nearest of
the enemy's forces. But with the exception of
this annulled brigade under Forey, and the two
Turkish battalions which had been left to guard
the baggage, the whole of the French and Ottoman
troops were now ranged upon the plateau of the
Telegraph Height. Their array was upon ground
less advanced than that taken up by the English.
It fronted towards the east.
XLIL
The position When Kiriakoff's movement of retreat had
Skoff.''^ brought him to the ridge which lay at a distance
of nearly two miles in rear of the Telegraph, he
forthwith took up a position, and once more
showed a front to the Allies. Having with him
not only his own artillery, but that also which
Prince Mentschikoff had brought from the centre
at the commencement of the action, and being in
company at this time with some of the cavalry, he
was able to complete the semblance of something
like a defensive stand by placing thirty guns in
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 303
battery, and covering his left-front with several CHAP.
squadrons of hussars. By this wise and soldierly '
attitude, Kiriakoff masked the confusion into JroVuled
which the rest of the Czar's army had been thrown, Aiues^'^y
and caused the Allied commanders to believe that attiiudt*^''"
they had still a formidable enemy in their front.
ISTot only did Kiriakoff thus face round, but he He moves
even caused the body of cavalry which he had on some
liis left to move forward; and it happened tliat ''"'^^'^'
this advance of the Eussian hussars brought them
down to a spot which was near the ground where
Lord Cardigan rode with his squadrons. It seems,
however, that there was an intervening bend or
rise in tlie formation of the ground which pre-
vented these two hostile bodies of cavahy from
being visible the one to the other.
Lord Eaglan, with some of his Staff, had ridden Lord
forward to this part of the field. He met the v^faSoa
advance of the enemy's squadrons with an almost
cold gaze. The joyous animation with which,
from the summit of the knoll, he had watched and
governed the battle — this now had passed. He
wore the look — men came to know it too well
before he died — the look which used to show that
he was feeling the stress of the French Alliance,
and dissembling the pain of his anger.
XLIII.
The world was old enough to know that in
order to be made to yield its natural fruits, a
victory ought to be followed up; and that, in
304 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, general, a victorious army is made to press on in
^' pursuit, until nightfall or other good cause makes
Question as it ucedful or prudent to halt. But the maps of
in which tliis Criui Tartarv gave no indication of the ex-
tliG rctrciit
should be istence of any fresh water between the Alma and
lut.ssed. . , .,
the Katcha — a stream some seven or eight nnles
distant. It seemed that unless the troops which
might be pushed forward could reach the Katcha
— and reach it, too, in strength enabling them to
establish themselves on its banks — they would
have to bivouac on the hills without the means of
allaying the rage of thirst. Except at the mouth
of the Alma, or at the mouth of the Katcha, the
nature of the coast did not allow free comnmnica-
tion between the Allied armies and the ships. It
was half-past four o'clock. Soon after six the sun
would set. Since morning the soldiery of both
armies had toiled under a burning sun. They
were very weary ; and many of them — indeed
almost all the English — were in a weakly state of
health. These were reasons which made it need-
ful for the Allies to effect their further pursuit of
the enemy by preconcerted arrangements, yet did
not apparently warrant a protracted halt of the
whole of the Allied armies on the heights of the
Alma. Lord Eaglan had been swift to see what
ought to be done by the Allies, and not less swift
to determine what he himself could offer to do.
r«rd He deemed that the Allies ouglit to push forward
opiiii!"!' instantly with such portions of their force as were
tlie least wearied. AVe liave seen the share which
the English soldiery had had in the work of the
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 305
(lay ; but, compared with the troops of the 1st, the CH A P.
2d, aud the Light Division, Sir Eichard England's ^_
Division was fresh. With that force of infantry, mspian.
together with the whole of his cavalry and horse-
artillery, Lord Eaglan desired to press forward ; *
but he required that a portion of the French army
should take part in this movement, for he did not
understand that the rout of the enemy's forces
was so complete and irremediable as to put them
in the power of one English division of infantry
and a thousand horsemen. Besides he well knew
that (even though the aid should be given for
mere form's sake and not for actual use) there was
a political reason which forbade him from pressing
forward without making sure that his advance
would be accompanied by a portion of the French
army ; for it was nearly certain that an English
general advancing on the afternoon of a battle,
and leaving his sensitive allies in the rear, would
so mortify the French people as to put the alliance,
and even the ruler who contrived it, in grievous
peril.
Accordingly, General Airey proposed to General itispro-
jNIartimprey, the Chief of the French Staff, tliat tiie French,
the whole of our cavalry, together with one
English division of infantry, and such portion of
tlie French army as the Marshal might think fit,
should move forward and press the enemy's retreat.
The answer was that any further advance of the They decline
French on that day was ' impossible ; ' and the
* He would then have still had with him (besides his fatigued
troops) the cliief part of the 4th Division under Cathcart.
VOL. IlL U
306 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. iiece.ssity of returning to where the knapsacks had
' been hiid was once more used as the reason wliich
Question forbade all forward movement. Men may i'airly
aiiouier sumiisc that a sterner method than that which
method witli T,-r,, , tit it-
tiie French J^ord I'agian took would have served his purpose
answered better, and that if he had simply ordered his
better. ' ...
cavalry and Sir Richard England's Division to ad-
vance, M. St Arnaud would have been compelled
to follow. But to act upon such a speculation as
that would have been hardly consistent with the
duties imposed upon the English General. Lord
Eaglan, it is true, was a soldier acting against an
enemy in the field ; but he was something more :
he was a diplomatist specially charged with the
care of that fragile structure on which the war
was resting ; he was charged with the care of the
French alliance. Except on grounds of paramount
cogency, he had no right to break loose from the
fetters by which his Queen's Government had
thought fit to bind their country.
XLIV.
nie close of Lord Eaglan watched the advance of the Rus-
sian cavalry until he saw it come to a halt. Then
it seemed — he was used of old to read such signs
— it seemed that he regarded this movement and
this halt of the enemy's horse as a kind of fare-
well gesture which marked the end of the battle ;
for, turning his horse's head, he slowly rode back
to the ground where his infantry stood.
When our soldiers observed the approach of the
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 307
Headquarter Staff, they looked eagerly into the chap,
group that they might see if amongst the plumed ^'
horsemen the Chief himself were coming ; and the The cheers
~ ' iliat greet
moment they got a sure sight of the frock with ^^g^fgn
the half-empty sleeve, it came into their hearts to
offer to their General that which is of other worth
than vulgar treasures — nay, that which in com-
mon times the world cannot give. They brought
him the greeting which a proud soldiery can be-
stow upon their chief in the hour of victory and
upon the field of battle. Begun at first by one
corps, taken up by the next, and then by the next
again, the cheers flew on from regiment to regi-
ment, and tracked the chief in his path, till, all
along from tlie spurs of the Telegraph Height to
the easternmost bounds of the crest which had
been won by the Highland Brigade, those desolate
hills in Grim Tartary were made to sound like
England. And the sound travelled back to the
plateau on which the French were halted, and
descended also the slopes where our dead and
wounded lay thick. There, many a red-coat, so
wounded that the roar of artillery and the tramp
of battalions liad become to him mere idle sounds,
would yet find his heart stirred anew by the
English cheers on the heights, and would raise
himself on his arm, and strive so to use his last
strength that, in the swelling tumult of the voices
above, his own faltering ' hurrah ! ' might be one.
But, pensive and intent on sad thoughts, Lord His visit
Eaglan now rode down into the valley, recrossed woundej
the river and entered the village of Bourliouk.
308 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. The flames had been extinguished ; and in some
• of tlie farm- buildings not wholly destroyed by fire,
there lay many wounded officers. Amongst the
painful scenes in those barns and sheds Lord
Eaglan passed a long time, giving tender care to
the sufferers. Yet of the sunlight of that day there
were nearly two hours remaining. There was a
routed enemy in front ; and, beyond, there lay
the huge prize for which the invaders had come.
Ambition lends strength and momentum to the
purposes of a general. Lord Eaglan gave his
heart to wounded men. A commander wrapped
in self, and burning for fame, would have risked a
breach of the Freuch alliance, would have har-
dened his heart, and, killing perhaps some few of
his people with cruel fatigue, would have drunk
of the Katcha that night. If he had done thus,
the reconnaissance of the next morning would
have brought him some knowledge of hardly less
worth than a victory.
The Allied The Allied forces bivouacked on the ground
bivouack- they had won. The French were on the Tele-
in;,' oil the .
t;roundthey <>raph Heifflit ; tlic Jinfdisli headquarters were
hud won. , , • 1 1 1 1 1 1
established on the left bank of the river near the
road leading up from the bridge, and almost on
the site of that Causeway battery which, until it
was touched by the mastering key, had barred the
mouth of the Pass.
Amvaiuf In the evenin" our army was joined by Colonel
the troops ^ o J J J
under Torreus with the troops which had been left at
Colonel _ ^
lorrens. Kiuiiishlu to clcar the beach ; and at about nine
o'clock, whilst Lord Eaglan was dining in his little
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 309
marquee with only one man for his guest, Torrens chap.
came to report his arrival. A third cover was ""_
laid for him. He had made a forced march, and
was in bitter pain because his great haste had not
availed to bring him up in time for the battle.
With kind, frank, thoughtful words Lord Eaglan
strove to soothe him.
XLV.
The position which Kiriakoff had taken up was continua-
not held for many minutes. To any calm man Russian
who looked from that ridge towards tlie north it
must have been plain that the Allies were mak-
ing no movement in pursuit. But — for thus
powerful and thus wayward is the imagination of
man in his fears — the Russians were no sooner
in safety than vague terrors came assailing their
minds, and Panic began to drive them. The
brave soldiery who had stood superbly firm when
shot were tearing their ranks were scared by
phantom thoughts; and the square-built, hard,
rigid battalions which had checkered the hill-
sides on the Alma, now dissolved into shapeless
masses. Even when, after accomplishing several
miles of retreat, the troops at length reached the
hillsides which looked down on the banks of the
Katcha, they had no belief that the Allies would
suffer them to drink of its waters in peace ; and
the army of the Czar, degenerating into a helpless
throng — officers, men, horses, guns, tumbrils, carts
laden with stores, carts laden with the wounded—-
310 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, all pressed into a gorge leading down to the ford :
^' and then the disorder was so complete, and the
masses which choked the gorge were so dense and
helpless, that it seemed as though a small force of
cavalry and horse-artillery would have sufficed to
make the whole army prisoners, or bring it to
utter ruin.
When they had crossed the Katcha, the bulk of
the troops still hurried on, though with no idea of
the direction they were to take, except that their
course ought to be a prolongation of the line of
the retreat already accomplished.
But presently even that poor clue failed them ;
for some got to imagine that, instead of falling
back upon Sebastopol, they were to make for
Baktchi Serai. Then darkness came ; and there
being no landmarks, the army was as a child that
has lost its way at night in a trackless moor.
Sometimes the masses were bent in their course
by a voice shouting out, ' To the right ! ' and then
again they would swerve the other way under the
impulse of a cry, ' To the left ! ' All idea of bear-
ings was so utterly lost, that even in their flight
the fugitives could no longer be sure that they
were retreating ; for they did not know but that
they might be marching all the while towards an
enemy. Afterwards the uselessuess of this wild
movement in the dark got to be understood ; and,
shouts for a halt becoming general, the masses at
length stood still.*
♦ One day at Balaclava I had some conversation with Lord
l{a"lan itspuctiug the panic which seized tl.e Kusslan army on
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 311
All this while, the Allied armies were quietly chap.
bivouacking upon the banks of the Ahna, at a ^'
distance of several miles from the enemy ; and,
the Staff of the Russian army having ascertained
that no pursuit was going on, mounted officers
and Cossacks were sent to announce to the
wandering battalions that the Katcha was the
rendezvous. But some of the messencjers liavimr
received these directions before they crossed the
river, carried on the very words entrusted to
them with the servile exactness of a Chinese
copyist, and told the troops which had long
ago forded the stream, and were thence march-
ing southward, that they were to 'go on to the
' Katcha.' Orders thus conveyed led to a belief
that the stream already passed was not the
Katcha; and although, in reality, the troops
had overstepped the place of rendezvous, they
imagined that they had not yet reached it.
Thus confusion was prolonged; but the halt
began after a time to produce good effects. The
officers called for men who could undertake
to find the way back to the Katcha. Some
were found. These acted as guides; and at
midnight the wearied troops regained the river.
For about two hours they rested ; but then —
by panic, it is believed, in the first instance,
the banks of the Katcha, and he told me that he thouglit
the panic may have been occasioned by the appearance of his
patrols ; but I have never heard from any other source that our
cavalry patrolled to the neighbourhood of the Katcha on the
evening of the battle ; and I imagine that Lord Raglan must have
epokeu rather from what he inferreil than from what he linew.
312 BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, and afterwards by orders wlucli tlie ])aiiic oii-
^' gendered — the army was hastily roused, and
thrown once more into full retreat. It moved
upon Sebastopol.*
XLVI.
rK)ssesof In this action the French lost three officers
killed ; "f* and on grounds which he deemed, and
(privately) stated to Le, to his mind 'conclusive,'
Lord Eaglan came to the belief that their whole
loss in killed was 60, and their number of
ofuic wounded 500. J The English army lost 25
Knslish. i tt i t
* i\Iy knowledge respecting the enemy s retreat to tlie Katcha
is mainly derived from Chodasiewicz ; but on the 23d of Sep-
tember the peasantry of the village of Eskel, on the banks of
the Katcha, desciiljcd to me the scene of panic which they had
witnessed in the night of the 20th.
t St Arnaud's Despatch.
J The French official accounts state the total loss of their
army in killed and wounded at 1339 (or, according to M. St
Arnaud's despatch, 1343), but those statements have not ob-
tained such credence as to induce me to place the figures in
the text. Lord Raglan, I know, believed not only that the
French returns were grossly erroneous, but that they were
intentionally falsified ; for in the same letter in which he states
it to be 'impossible' their accounts could be true, he also
speaks of the 'pains' which the French authorities took to
make him believe them. On the other hand, I think it right
to say that I am acquainted with the grounds on which Lord
Raglan based his low estimate of the French losses, and that,
not thinking tliem quite so conclusive as he did, I have
abstained from hazarding a positive statement on the .subject.
Tlie field of battle did not give indication of considerable losses
by the French ; and I recollect that the morning after the
battle a French soldier told me he estimated the whole loss
of his people at fifty (une cinquantaine). As an actual estimate
of the losses, of course, his statement was of no worth, but it
went towards showing what was the first impression of the
French army as to the extent of the carnage.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 313
ofticcrs and 19 sergeants killed, and 81 officers chap.
and 102 sergeants wounded ; and of rank and '
file 318 killed and 1438 wounded ; making,
with the 19 who were missing, and who are
supposed to have been buried in the ruins of
the houses in the village, a total loss of 2002.
Including 5 generals, 23 field officers, and 170 or the
officers of lower rank, the loss of the Russians
in killed and wounded was officially stated at
5709 ; and of that number no less than 3121
were casualties sustained by one division alone —
sustained by those 16 battalions of the Vladimir,
the Kazan, the Sousdal, and the Ouglitz regi-
ments which we saw engaged with our troops
on the slopes of the Kourgan^ Hill Except
the Russians left wounded on the field, there
were scarcely any prisoners taken by the Allies ;
and by the Russians none. Amongst the wound-
ed Russians left on the field and taken by the
English there were two general officers. Great
quantities of small -arms were left upon the
ground ; but of prouder trophies there were few.
The French captured a small four-wheeled open The trophies
carriage, in which a clerk had been travelling were scanty
with some official papers. The English had the
gun taken by Captain Bell, and the howitzer
abandoned by the enemy in the Great Redoubt.*
* On the following day tlie French quietly came with an
artillery-team, and were going to carry off one of the guns
taken by the English. An English officer caught them in
the act, and prevented them from executing their purpose.
This entcrpi'ising attempt was the more curious, since it hap-
pened that the gun was more than a mile distant from tho
614
BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CUAP.
I.
Question
as to the
expediency
ol'attackiii;^
tlie RussiiiM
position iu
Iront.
The plan
actually
followed by
fit Arnaud.
XLVII.
Wlietlier it was wise to assail the euemy on his
chosen ground, and to do so by a front attack in-
stead of moving first so far eastward as to be able
to come down on his left flank and compel him to
iiglit witli his back to the sea — this is a question
highly interesting to soldiers ; * but no such design
was put forward at the time ; and, if what Mar-
shal St Arnaud definitively sought to do can be
inferred from what he did, his intention as ulti-
mately moulded was simply this : he resolved to
The Russian Army.
English Army.
The French Army.
possess himself of the unoccupied ground which
lay between the Russian position and the sea-
shore, to pit tlie rest of his forces against Prince
ground on which the nearest of the French troops had been
moving. Apparently it was calculated that any Englishman
who chanced to observe the French drivers would assume that
they were acting under authority from Lord Raglan, and
that when once the gun was in the French lines, the trans-
cendant importance of the alliance, and of a cordial feeling
between the two armies, would be relied on as grounds which
might prevent the English General from reclaiming it.
* Marshal Pelissier (the Duke of Malakolf) oncesiroke to me
with immense vehemence on tins subject, showing how, if he
had been in command, he would have rolled up the Russian
army from its right to its left and driven it to its utter destruc-
tion.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 316
Mentschikoff s left, and to leave to Lord Raglan chap.
1.
the duty of dealing with the enemy's centre, as
well as with his right wing.
XLVIIL
Told summarily, the battle of the Alma was summary o<
this : — The French seized the empty ground
which divided the enemy from the sea, and then
undertook to assail the enemy's left wing; but
were baffled by the want of a road for Canrobert's
artillery, and by the exceeding cogency of the
rule which forbids them from engaging their in-
fantry on open ground without the support of
cannon. Their failure placed them in jeopardy •
for they had committed so large proportion of
their force to tlie distant part of the West Cliff
and the sea-shore, that for nearly an hour they
lay much at the mercy of any Eussian general
who might have chosen to take advantage of
their severed condition. But, instead of turning
to his own glory the mistake the French had been
making, Prince Mentschikoff hastened to copy it,
wasting time and strength in a march towards
the sea-shore, and a counter-march back to the
Telegraph. Still, the sense the French had of
their failure, and the galling fire which Kiria-
koff's two batteries were by this time bringing
to bear on them, began to create in their army
a grave discontent, and sensations scarce short
of despondency. Seeing the danger to wliich this
condition of things was leadin«i, and becoming
31 G BATTLE OF TIIK ALMA.
CHAP, for other reasons iiiiputicnt, Lord Eaglan deter-
'. mined to order tlie final advance of the Eng-
lish infantry without waiting any longer for
the time when Canvohert and Prince Napoleon
should be established on the plateau. So the
English infantry went forward, and in a few
minutes the battalions wliich followed Codrington
had not only defeated the two heavy columns
which marched down to assail them, but had
stormed and carried tlie Great Ticdoubt. From
that moment the hillsides on the Alma were
no longer a fortified position ; but they were
still a battle-field, and a battle-field on which,
for a time, the combatants were destined to meet
with checkered fortune ; for, not having been
supported at the right minute, and being encom-
passed by great organised numbers, General Cod-
rington's disordered force was made to fall back
under the weiglit of the Vladimir column ; and
its retreat involved the centre battalion of the
brigade of Guards. Nearly at the same time
Kiriakoff, with his great 'column of the eight
' battalions,' pu.shed Canrobert down from the
crest he had reached, obliging or causing him
for the moment to hang back under the cover
of the steep. At that time, the prospects of the
Allies were overcast. But then the whole face
of the battle was suddenly changed by the two
guns which Lord Eaglan had brought up to the
knoll ; for not only did their fire extirpate the
Causeway batteries, and so lay open the Pass,
t)iit it tore throuoh the columns of Prince Ment-
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 317
schikoff's infantry reserves, and drove them at chap
once from the field. This discomfiture of the '._
Russian centre could not but govern the policy
of Kiriakoff, obliging him to conform to its move-
ment of retreat ; and he must have been the more
ready to acknowledge to himself the necessity of
the step he was taking, since by this time he had
suffered the disaster which was inflicted upon liis
great 'column of the eight battalions' by the
French artillery. He retreated without being
molested by the French infantry, to take up a
nev/ position at a distance of two miles from the
Alma ; and soon afterwards, though the heads of
their columns were struck by artillery fire, the
French thronging up in great strength took pos-
session of the Telegraph Height. At the moment
when the French heads of columns appeared on
the crest they had reached, Colonel Hood's Grena-
diers in a distant part of the field were moving up
to attack the battalions confronting them on the
Kourgane Hill, and there, within a few minutes
after a sheer fight of infantry, the enemy's whole
strength was broken and turned to ruin by the
Guards and the Highlanders. Thenceforth the
slaughter that is wrought by artillery upon
retreatiug masses was all that remained to be
fulfiUed.
XLIX.
The trophies, we saw, were scanty. But was Themceacf
there a gain of that priceless spoil which one earned on
° ^ . ^ . tlie Alms.
nation takes from another when it proves itself the
318 BxVTTLE OF THE .VLMA.
CHAP, better in urnis ? The Western Alliance had the ear
^- of Europe, and it awarded to itself au unstinted
measure of glory. Was this glory honestly taken ?
How fur The Allies were more than 60,000, and of that
strength the Russians fell short by a difference
Uiu Allies
were eu-
lUe gioiy exceeding one-third. This was a disparity which
to them-
selves
made it unbecoming for the Great Alliance of the
West to indulge in the language of a boisterous
triumph. But, besides that the strength of the
ground went some way towards making the con-
flict equal, the very faults and shortcomings of
the Allies had the effect of putting a heavy stress
upon some portions of their united army ; for, by
sending two-fifths of his army to the seashore,
and l)y crowding the remainder of it upon a
narrow front, the French jMarshal placed Prince
Gortschakoff and General Kvetzinski upon a
numerical equality with their English foes ; * and,
the ground that our people assailed being en-
trenched and singularly strong by nature, the
Russians in that respect had of course a great
advantage over their English adversaries. Be-
sides, though our forces were about equal in
numbers to the part of the Russian army with
which they had to deal, yet it happened that in
each distinct infantry fight the English battalions
were almost always confronted by masses far, far
gr(!ater in numerical strength. Justly, therefore,
there may be rendered to some of the components
of the Allied army a part of the glory which
History must refuse to the aggregate host.
* Sec Appendix, No. II.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 319
At three o'clock, as we saw, the battle had c ii a r
beea suffered to lapse into such a condition that
there was then bitter need of a general, and of
troops so placed in the field, and so inclined to-
wards the practice of close fighting, as to be able
to restore — to restore, as it were, by sheer force —
the waning fortune of the day. How the occasion
was met this History has shown. I narrate, and
soldiers will comment. They must judge, and
say whether, for simplicity's sake, it be better to
pile up a heap of praise, and distribute it, like a
cargo of medals, amongst all the French, English,
and Turks who heard the sound of the guns ; or,
in a harsher and more careful spirit, to part off
the troops which fought hard from the troops
which scarce fought at all, and to show by whose
ordering it was tliat the course of the battle was
governed.
I have been eager to acknowledge the valour
and the steadiness of the Eussian infantry. If I
had caused it to appear that, upon the whole.
Marshal St Arnaud and the troops he commanded
had done marvels on the day of the Alma, I should
have been helping to prolong a belief in that
which I know to be false, and should be even
running counter to what, with f^ood reason, I hold
to be the opinion of the French army ; * but I
* I spoak in great measure from knowledge ac>iuired long
subsequently to the battle, but the conviction of which I speak
was not slow to show itself in the French army. Writing three
days after the battle, Lord liaglan said, 'The French arnjy
' accomplished what they undertook perfectly well ; ' but then,
and speaking of the conviction which was produced upon tha
I.
320 BATTI.E OF THE ALMA.
CHAP, liave tried to do careful justice to those who were
• tlien our allies by ruarkiiig and coinnieiiding- the
v/arlike quality wliich was displayed by their
artilleryiueii, as well as by their keen, bold, active
skirmishers. Of my own countrymen I have
hardly once suffered myself to speak in words of
praise. I liave only told what they did.
It was thus that, during three sunny hours, a
French and an English army fought side by side
on the Alma ; but in comparing the conduct iu
battle of the two allied forces, it ought to be always
remembered that the French were under a ban.
Cause tend- It would bc uujust to look upou thc action be-
l"urtho"' tween Marshal St Arnaud and the Russian left
oiuie Wing as a Ian- sample or what a iuencii army can
army*^' do. That glaucc at the things done in Paris
wliich helped us to understand the origin of the
Anglo-French alliance, will now serve to teach us
the cause of any shortcomings which may be
attributed to the army commanded by Marshal St
English army by the fact that Marslial St Arnaud had not ' kejtt
' moving on after he had turned the enemy's left,' he adds, ' 1
' have reason to believe that the same feeling is prevalent
' amongst the officers of the French army.' See extract m the
Appeudi.x, No. X. For any one who was not in the Crimea
during the month which followed the battle of the Alma, it
would be difficult to form a conception of the state into which
the repute of the Frencli army had fiiUen. Later events (and
the first of these was the brilliant charge of two squadrons of
thc Chasseurs d'Afri([ue at Balaclava) showed tli;it the warlike
spirit of Frauce was not extinct iu her army.
BATTLE OF THE ALMA. 321
Aniaud.* Wc saw sometliing of a strange decree chap.
which enacted that services rendered by military ,.
men in their operations against Frenchmen shonld
hold good as titles to advancement in the same
way as though they were deeds done in war
against the foreigner.-f- Incredible as it may
seem, that decree was long observed to the full ; :j:
and the shameful principle which it involved was
made to weigh heavily upon France during sev-
eral of the months which followed the landing
at Old Fort. Indeed, the principle, though partly
waived for a time in 1855, was found to be 'still
in dire operation long after tlie close of the Eus-
sian war. -last as in a later year the French
Emperor entrusted to a scared and bewildered
literary man the command of a whole French
army in Italy, so now he committed the honour
of the flag — committed it almost exclusively — to
men who had shared with him in the adventure
which put France under his feet. His reckoning
was, that whether it were led by honourable and
skilled commanders, or were tossed and flung into
action by him and his December friends, a French
army engaged in a short, brisk war against a
Continental State would always be likely to push
its way to more or less of success ; and that if it
should chance to do this under the leadership, or
apparent leadership, of him and his friends, he
* 'Invasion of the Crimea,' voL i. chap. xiv.
t Ibid. Decree of 5th Decemher 1851.
t It was carried to the length of making Jlagnan and St
Arnaud ifar.shals of France.
VOL. TH. X
322 BATTLE OF THE AL:MA.
CHAP, aiul tliey would l)cconic similar to licroos. If
'__ they could attain to he tlius thouglit of for a
time, they might hope that for a still longer
period they would enjoy the immunity and the
thousand rewards which nations are accustomed
to lavish upon victorious commanders.
This was the principle which governed the
choice of the man to whose charge, on the day of
the Alma, the honour of the French arms was left.
He who commanded the army was St Arnaud,
formerly Le Eoy, the person suborned by Fleury.
Under him in the Crimea there were four Divisions
of French infantry. lie who commanded thefir^t
of these Divisions was Canrobert. This officer, as
I have said, was not without honest titles to
military distinction ; but whilst he had a profes-
sional repute which would have earned him the
approval of even the most loyal of monarchs, l^'
had also the qualification which entitled him td
the favour of the French Emperor. He had couj-
inanded one of the brigades which operated against
the gay boulevards on the 4th of December. Th:3
2d Division was commanded by Bo.squet. Bosquet
■was a man without a stain ; but he was the only
French General of Division at the Alma who
could say that he did not owe his command to
the December plot; and since it happened that
he w^as left isolated with only one brigade during
the whole time when the issue of the battle w^as
pending, his presence at the Alma was only an
imperfect exception to what was, as it were, the
general rule. He who commanded the large
BATTLE OF TIIK ALMA. 323
detaclied force of some 9000 men* wliich first chap.
crossed the river at its nioutli was General Bouat; '.
and Bouat, it seems, was an officer who earned his
command by exploits against Parisians in the
boulevard, the Hue St Denis, or the neighbourhood
of the Nouvelle France."f* lie who commanded the
3d Division was Prince Napoleon. He who com-
manded the 4th Division Avas Fore}' ; and no man
could come within the principle of selection more
clearly than he did, for it was he of whom I spoke
when I said that he had suffered himself to be used
as the assailant and thejailer of an unarmed Legis-
lature. There were, besides, the Lonrmels, the
Espinasses, and numbers of others, no doubt,
whose names could be easily found in their Em-
peror's list of worthies. Therefore it is that the
part which was taken by Marshal St Arnaud and
his troops in the battle of the Alma was no fair
sample of wdiat could be done by a French army.
It was only a sample of what a French army
could manage to do when it laboured under tlie
weight of a destiny which ordained that all its
chiefs should be men chosen for their complicity
in a midnight plot, or else for acts of street
slaughter.| Because they had perpetrated an
extensive massacre of tJieir OAvn fellow^-country-
inen, there was no certainty, perhaps, that they
* One of Bosquet's brigades and the whole of the Turkish Con-
tingent, except the two battalions left to guard the baggage.
t With the 33d Regiment.
J Prince Napoleon's complicity was only, as I am inclined to
believe, a complicity after the fact ; but it i.s, of course, clear
enough that lie owed his command entirely to the Coup d'Elat.
o2-l BATTLE OF THE ALMA.
CHAP. Illicit not "be men firm and able in lionest war
I .
' against tlie foreigner ; but also there ^vas no such
close similarity between what these men had done
in Paris and what they Mere meant to do in the
Crimea, as to warrant the notion of entrusting to
thera almost exclusively the honour of the French
flag. There was a salient point of difference
between the boidevards and the hillsides of the
Alma, — the Russians were armed.
jSTo ! The Power which fought that day by the
side of England was not, after all, mighty Prance,
— brave, warlike, impetuous Prance ; — it was only
that intermittent thing which to-day is, and to-
morrow is not ; — it was what people call ' The
' Prench Em})iiv.'*
LI.
rffpctnf The battle of the Alma seemed to clear the pro-
unontiie spccts of tlic Campaign and even of the war. It
ITOSPCt-'t S
oftiie confirmed to the Allies that militar-y ascendancy
over Russia which had been more than half gained
already by the valour of the Ottoman soldiery. It
lent the current sanction of a victory to the haz-
ardous enterprise of the invasion. It ended the
l)erils of the march from Kamishlu, and made
smooth the whole way to the Belbec. It estab-
lished the Allies as invaders in a province of
Russia. It did more. It offeied them even Sebas-
topol, but always, nevertheless, upon condition
that they would lay instant hands on the prize.
* Tliis was first piilili.'^hcd in January 1SG3, and in exactly
the same words as now.
caiiiiiaign.
THE HALT UN THE ElELD OF THE AL.MA. 3J5
CHAPTER 11.
When the fi^htinf? on the banks of the Alma had chap.
. .II.
ceased along the whole line, more than one of the
English generals prayed hard that their troops
might be suffered to come down and bivouac near
the bank of the stream ; for the labour already
undergone by the men had been so great, that it
was painful to have them distressed by the toil
of going a long way for water, and fetching it
up to the heights. But not choosing to loose xiieAiued
his hold of ground carried at no small cost of the battie'oi
life, Lord Eaglan was steadfast in his resist-
ance to all these entreaties, and ordered that his
troops should bivouac upon tlie heights they had
won.
Witli the sanction of his chief, General Airey
placed our infantry for the night in a line of
columns on the heights, with the artillery in rear
of each column ; and the disposition of these two
arms had been so contrived that, although the
artillery was covered, yet at any moment, and
without there being any need of moving the
infantry, tlie guns could be rapidly brought to
32G Tin: ifAi/r ox the
(■■j^j.^^P tlie front, ami ])laccil in battery l»et\vecn the
^'- culumiis. lu this order, anil liaving a portion of
the cavah'}' coverini^' the rear, witli the rest of our
horsenieu oil its left fhink, the Enj^lisli army
bivouacked for the night.
When General Martiniprey learnt that this plan
had been adopted by the J:^nglish, he was so well
pleased with it that he resolved to advise a like
disposition of the French army.
During tlie battle, the waggons which hjUowed
the Englisli army liad, of course, been kept far
enough in the lear to be, for the most part, out
of fire; but when the fighting had ceased, they
were brought down towards the bridge, and soon
became so crowded as to breed much confusion.
For hours, and even, I think, all night, men were
eagerly seeking after otliers win mi none could
help them to find.
On the night which followed tlie battle, men
M-ere sickening and dying of cholera in numbers
as great as before.
That which lay in the sight of the troops when
the fight on the Alma had ceased, was new
to the bulk of the soldiery, and, in one feature,
new to all. In general, the wan-ing armies of
state of Uie Europc liavc bccn followed by a hateful swarm,
fiel<l after
the battle, who make it their livelihood to hover upon the
march of the regiments, alighting at last upon a
field of battle, that they may rifle the dead and
the wounded. And there comes, too, that other
and yet fouler swarm which strips the dead of
their clothing and accoutrements with so strange
FIELD OF THE ALMA. 327
a swiftness, that a field wliieli was speckled and en a P.
glittering, at the close of the battle, with the ^''j
uniforms of prostrate soldiers, is changed of a sud-
den to a ghastly shamble, with little except maimed
or dead horses, and the buff, naked corpses of
men, to show where the battle has raged.
But the breadth of the lands and the seas which
divide this simple Grim Tartary from the great
seats of European vice, had hitherto defeated the
baneful energy of those who come out to prey
upon armies by selling strong drinks, and robbing
the dead and the wounded. Armed and clothed
as he stood when, receiving his death-wound, he
heard the last of the din of battle, so now the
soldier lay. Many had been struck in such a
manner that their limbs were suddenly stiffened,
and this so tixedly, that, although their bodies fell
to the ground, their hands and arms remained
held in the very posture they chanced to be in at
the moment of death.* This was observed, for
the most part, in instances of soldiers who had
been on the point of firing at the moment when
they were struck dead; for, where this had hap-
pened, the man's hands being thrown forward and
fixed in the attitude required for levelling a fire-
lock, they of course stretched upwards towards
the heavens when the body fell back upon the
ground. These upstretched arms of dead men
* Medical men knew, a.s inffjht be expected, that this cata-
lepsy-like stiffness might now and then result from a gunshot
wound ; but I believe they were somewhat surprised at the
large propoi'tion of instances in which it occurred.
328 THE HALT OX THE
CHAP. Avere ghastly in the eyes of some: others thouglit
^^' they could envy the soldier released at last from
liis toil, and encountering no moment of interval
between hard fighting and death.
In general, the undisturbed clothing of the
stricken soldiers hid their wounds from a com-
mon observer ; and it was only here and there —
as where a man's head had been partly shot away,
or where the skull had been entered by a cannon-
ball — that the ugliness of the havoc was obtruded
upon the sight. For the most part, the wounded
men lay silent. Now and then a man would
gently ask for water, or w-ould seek to know-
when it was likely that he would be moved and
cared for ; but, in general, the wounded were so
little inclined to be craving after help or sym-
pathy, that for dignity and composure thoy were
almost the equals of the dead.
Still, although there was nothing in the held of
the battle which could mar the dignity of war,
the sight was of a kind to press hurtfully upon
the imagination of young soldiers. For such
troops it Avas an ill thing to be kept a long time
together in the contemplation of a field strewn
with dead and wounded ; and this the more be-
cause the sight went to make a man question the
cause of the slaughter in his own corps. None
can wonder if the survivors of the Light Division
men who had stormed the redoubt were inclined
to let their thoughts dwell upon the nature of the
trial to which they had been exposed, and even,
in some regiments, to comment, and soy, ' "Wu
FIELD OF THE ALMA. 329
' were sacrificed.' * lu such questioninns there is chap.
danger. .
That priceless coufidence which sustains tlie
accomplished soldier, and gives him the mastery
in battle, is, after all, a sentiment of a tender and
delicate kind, which may be easily weakened or
destroyed, if he comes to believe that his regiment
has been mishandled in a bloody encounter ; and
it could not but happen that regiments which had
suffered great losses would be encouraged in the
indulgence of a sinister criticism by keeping them
long on the ground where their comrades lay
maimed and slaughtered.f
On the day after the battle, the hundreds ofFawofihe
. ... „ wouiide'l
Eussians who lay wounded on the English part oi Russians,
the field had been brought to a sheltered spot of
ground near the river. :j: There, they were laid
down in even parallel ranks, and in such manner
tliat the surface they covered with their prostrate
bodies was a large symmetrical obloug. The
ground where they lay was at some short distance
from the Headquarters camp, and but little ex-
* I myself, in passing, heard this tlie day after the battle.
The sentence was uttered in a group of private soldiers belong-
ing to one of the regiments of the Light Division.
t Many will recognise the high authority which is my war-
rant for venturing this remark, and for insisting on the danger
to wliich the morale of the Light Division was exposed by its
experience on the day of the Alma. Over, and over, and over
again. Lord Clyde used to say that no troops in the world could
be subjected to such a trial without undergoing a minous loss
of soldierly coufidence.
t The number, I believe, was about 500 ; but it was estunated,
and on some authority, at 750.
33U TUH HALT OX THK
r II Ai". posed to view. From this, and from otlier circiim-
J_|_- stances, it happened that not only tlie wounded
Russians, but also the English soldiers mounting
guard at the spot, were forgotten, and left without
food for many hours. lUit happily there was a
man at Headquarters whose sense of honour and
duty was supported by a strong will, by resistless
energy, and a soundness of judgment and com-
mand of temper rarely united with great activity,
llomaine came to know that these poor wounded
Russians were lying untended, and he judged that,
\inless they were cared for, there would be a last-
ing blot upon the honour of the English name.
An officer of the common stamp who had got to
be possessed with such a feeling would have
cheaply discharged his conscience by making a
communication to Lord Raglan, or some other
' pioper authority.' It was not so that the task
was passed on, and got rid of. Knowing the
weight of the cares pressing upon the chief, Ro-
maine did not appeal to Lord Raglan, but began
to act himself, giving no repose to any whose aid
he needed, but disturbing nobody else. Under
the power of his generous indignation and strong
will all lethargy slowly gave way ; and, having
obtained four liumlred pounds of biscuit, and the
number of hands that were needed to aid him in
the undertaking, he toiled at his good work until
there was no one in all those prostrate ranks of
wounded men who had not been tended with the
olfer of food and water. It was from seven in the
evening until half-past eleven at night that lie
FIELD OF THE ALMA. 331
thus labuiuud. At the time, his exceeding zeal chap.
made him seem to he acting for the honour of i^_^
some great cause much more than from tender
pity; but what he felt he has owned and recorded:
' It was tlie most painful act,' he says, ' I ever had
' to perform. Some of the faces were terrible and
' ghastly from wounds, and hardly had mouths to
' eat or drink with. They were faces to haunt one
' in sleep.' One young man in the centre of a
rank of prostrate soldiers sat u{>, and succeeded in
causing himself to be distinguished as an officer ;
and although there were few or none amongst the
other sufferers who could speak any tongue but
their own, there was a plaintive melody in the
sound of the words they uttered which served to
convey to a stranger an idea of their gentleness
and gratitude. There were some who, in cheerful
tones, declined to prolong life by eating, and asked
instead for a light. Sankey, of the Quartermaster-
General's department, entered into Eomaine's
i'eeling with great warmth, and not only shared
with him in the bodily labour offending the suf-
ferers, but helped to overcome the difficulty that
there is in wringing new kinds of exertion from
people who are over-much r(>g\i]ated. Of course,
the English sentries, who had been left for a time
without food, were at once supplied with biscuit ;
but it did not at all delight them to have the m.ere
staff of life without any of what they regarded as
tlie more cheering part of their rations.
There was no enemy's force at hand to whom
the care of these wounded Paissians could be jjiven
332 TiiH HALT OX Tiir:
CHAP, up; and, wiLhiii the period of tlie ludt on tlie
__ill__ Alma, it was not practicable for tlie I'Jiglisli to do
more than get their own wounded men on board
ship. So when, on the morning of the 23d, the
Allies resumed their advance, the wounded Rus-
sians were left where they lay on the banks oi
the Alma, in charge of a medical officer. As soon
as might be, they were to be got on board ship
and sent to some Russian port under a flag of
truce.
It fell to the lot of Dr Thompson, assistant-
surgeon of the 44th Regiment, to be left with the
charge of these sufferers in a country abandoned
to the enemy.* He kept with him his servant, a
soldier named John M'Grath, but no other was
left to take part with him in the performance of
the forlorn duty that he had to fulfil.-}- In the
event of a Russian force coming upon this sur-
* I have always understood that Dr Thompson was ordered
upon this painful duty, but the language of Captain Lushington
rather leads to the inference that Dr Thompson had volunteered
the service. See the next note.
t Captain Lushington to Admiral Dundas, 27th September
1854. Captain Lushington speaks of Dr Thompson, with his
servant M'Grath, as having 'remained alone in an enemy's
' country, without tent or accommodation of any sort, for the
' sole purpose of alleviating the sufferings of 500 of his fellow-
' creatures.' And Dundas, in reporting the matter to Lord
Ra'dan, speaks of Dr Thompson and his servant as having
' remained by themselves in an open country, without food or
' shelter.' — Dundas to Lord Raglan, official despatch, 30th
September 1854. What they needed, however, was the help of
their fellow-men, not shelter; and with regard to Dundas's
idea of their having been without food. Lord Eaglan, I see,
with his own hand, has written on the margin opposite to that
passage the following words : ' Theij had food. IV
II.
FIELD OF THI-: ALMA. 3o3
gcou and his attendant whilst left alone with their chap.
charge, the best fate they conld hope for was that
of being prisoners of war ; bnt unless their idea of
the modern ' Cossacks ' was other than that which
commonly obtained in the Allied armies, they
must have believed themselves to be in more or
less danger of barbarous treatment. *
The arrangement imposing such a service must
have been made in the full assurance that there
would be no cruel delay in the arrival of succour
fi-om the fleet ; but (from causes to me unknown)
it did actually happen that, between the time
when the army marched off, and the time when
succour came, there was an interval of three days
and three nights. f Of the five hundred ghastly
and prostrate forms which were left to this one
surgeon and his one attendant for their only com-
panions, all were so stricken as to be unable to
help to lift a body; A'ery many were shattered
in limb ; very many, still tortured by strong
remains of life, were lying on their faces, with
their vitals ploughed open by round-shot; but
some were dying more quickly, and others already
lay dead, j From time to time during those
* It was observed, I think, in a former volnrne, that the
mndern Cossacks were obedient regiments of regular cavalry,
with nothing of the wild, lawless character which belonged to
the Cossacks of 1812 ; b\it the fact that this change had oc-
cTured was not general!}- known in the Allied armies.
t From the morning of the 23d to the morning of the 26tl-..
Lushington reached the anchorage late at night on the 25th,
and the next morning early went np to the gi'ound where the
wounded Eussians were lying. — Lushington to Dundas, 27th
September 1851. " + H'id.
33 t THE HALT ON THI-
CHAP, three da3-s, and to tho utinnst of tlieir bodily
. 1__ strength, Dr Thompson and his servant laboured
to part the dead from the living, to heave the
corpses away, and get them more or less under-
ground ; but ^\ hen, at last, succour came, our
seamen had to lil't out as many as thirty-nine
bodies — some, in part, decomposed — before they
could get at tlie living.*
"When at length, on the morning of the 2Gth,
Captain Lushington of the Albion came up from
the shore, and discovered his two fellow-country-
men at their dismal post of duty, he was filled
with admiration of their fortitude, and with
sympathy for what they had endured. t
All that day, and for five or six hours more on
the following morning, the seamen of the Albion
and tho Vesuvius, being well provided with
stretchers, laboured hard, and with cheerful
alacrity, at the business of cariying the sufferers
on board ship ; and there only remained about
fifty of the wounded still lying on tlie ground,
wdien the appearance of a Russian infantry force,
which was judged to be three thousand strong,
obliged Captain Lushington to give up the rest of
his ta.sk. :^
* Lushington to Dundas, 27th September 1854.
+ Ibid. Captain Lushington wa.s despatclied on thi.s duty in
hi.s ship, the Albion, towed by the Vesuvius, and liaving the
Avon transport in company.
+ Ibid. The arrangements made by Captain Lushington f(«r
covcaing the working parties who carried the wounded, and
for etTecting the orderly retreat of his marines and small-arms
men, seem to have been very able and neatly timed.
riELD OF THE ALJIA. 335
The wounded men cari'ied on board slii]) were CfiAP.
- II
sent to Odes:-;a under a flag of truce ; * and the '
number of those wlio lived to be thus delivered
up to their fellow-countrymen was 342 -,7 but so
utter a weakness had prostrated this suffering
mass of human beings, that the Governor of
Odessa declared it impossible, for the time, to
make out by question and answer how many of
them were non-commissioned officers and how
many private soldiers. :J:
In his letter to the Governor of Odessa, Duudas
had spoken of the surrender of these wounded
men as an act dictated by feelings of humanity. §
The answer of the Governor was so stern and cold
as to make Dundas remark that it ' might ha^■e
'been more gracious ;'1| but remembering what
was the aspect of those wounded men on tire
morrow of the battle, and inferring the state
* Dundas to Lord Raglan, private letter, SOtli September
1854.
+ Acknowledgment dated ^| September 1854, signed by
General AnnenkoiF, the Governor of Odessa.
J The Governor saj^s, he does not distinguish the non-
commissioned officers from the privates, 'par I'impossibilit^
' d'en questionner la plupart dans I'etat d'affaiblissement oh
'ils se trouvent. '
§ Dundas to the Governor of Odessa : ' I trust yonr Excel-
' lency -will, in the same feeling of humanity, receive and
' consider them as non-combatants until regularly exchanged.'
II Dundas to Lord Raglan, 30th September 18,54. The
answer of the Governor to Dundas, H September, refers
coldly to the acknowledgment — the one above quoted — which
lie, the Governor, had given ; and adds, that he will com-
nmnicate to the Emperor the arrival of the wounded, and
the condition which Dundas annexed to the surrender cf
thcin.
335 THE HALT ON THE
CHAP, i^iiey y^-Q-^-Q in at the time of tliciv reachiiirr tli
port, I can excuse the Governor of Odessa if he
angered a little at the sight of the word 'humanity,'
and almost thought himself mocked when he was
asked to agree that these poor remains of what
once had been soldiers might be considered as
' non-combatants ' until they should be exchanged.
If Dundas had boarded the Avon, and looked on
those ruins of human forms with wliich she was
laden, his kindly heart would rather have inclined
him to utter his sorrow for the havoc inflicted by
war, than to speak as though he were indulging
in any act of humanity* With only, perhaps,
too much truth, he might have palliated any
seeming neglect of those poor llussian prisoners
by alleging the hardships and privations which
he could not find means to avert from our own
sick and wounded men.
* To make the act an act of 'huiiiaiiity,' I suppose some-
thin" like sacrifice was needed, hut there was none. The poor
wounded men were simply an encumlirnnce, which it was con-
Ttnient to ahift oil" upon the Kussians.
FIELD OF THE ALMA. 337
CHAPTER III.
"We saw that, at the close of the fight on tlie Alma chap.
HI.
an unwillingness to lengthen the distance between
the French and their knapsacks, then lying in the
valley below, was the reason avowed by St Arnaud
for withstanding Lord Eaglan's desire to advance
at once in pursuit ; but, unless there were some Expediency
other and heavier shackle which still held back \y loumwng
the Allies, there could hardly be room for question vu-ton'.
that, on the morrow of the battle at latest, it would
be well for them to push forward and follow up
their victory. Yet they lingered on the ground
they had won for the whole of two clear days.
The reason why they thus remained halted must
not be kept in concealment.*
It had hitherto been taken for granted that the
* Rotli in his official and private correspondence with thi;
Home Government, Lord Raglan is silent as to the causes of
tlie halt on the Alma, and neither records liis endeavours to
bring Marshal St Arnaud to march upon the position of the Star
Fort, nor the Marshal's refusal to do so. As to the cause of
this reserve, I hazard my surmise in another volume — 'Invasion
of the Crimea,' vol. iv. chap. vii. of Cabinet Edition. It is
fortunate that the silence of the English Commander has been
in some measure compensated by other testimony.
VOL. in. T
33S
THE HALT ON TIIF.
CHAP.
III.
Causes of
the pro-
tracted
lialt on
the Alma ;
ami of an
inchoate
intention
to abstain
from attack-
ing tl)e
Nort)i i'orts.
Allies were to iiiavch upon the Sevevnayn, or iiovlli
side of Sebastopol ; and — not at first harbourinj,'
the thought that Marshal St Arnaud would swerve
from the purpose with which the Allies had come
out — Lord Eaglan deemed it to be of great moment
to press on, and at once attack the northern forts,
without giving the enemy time to recover from
the blow which had felled liim. As expressed —
not in language originating with Lord Raglan
himself, but by his declared concurrence in the
statement of opinion submitted to him by Sir
Edmund Lyons, — Lord Piaglan conceived 'that
' the character of the whole expedition was that of
' a surprise, that it was undertaken Avithout accur-
' ate knowledge of the strength of the enemy or
' their resources, and that in great measure they
' [the Allies] still remained ignorant on these
' points ; that all they knew positively was, that
' the victory at Alma had been a heavy blow to
' them, and that the best chance of continued
' success was to follow it up rtipidly, and try and
' take the Nortliern Forts by a coup-dc-main!*
* MS. Menior.iiidnni of a conversation held with Sir Ednnuul
Lyons on tlie 10th of February 1856, hy Mr George Loch. The
memorandum was phiced in Sir Edmund's liands on the same
(Lay, and after lie had read it over, he returned it with a state-
ment that it was correct ; and, a note stating that approval
having been forthwitli made, the paper became, \\\)0\\ tlie deatli
of Sir Edmund liyons, a valuable and authentic record. Its
value was increased by the corroboration which was given to it
in writing by the late Duke of Kewcastle.— See Appendix, No.
XL, wliere will lie found all tliat portion of the memorandum
which relatr-s to affairs touched in tliis an<I the next volume.
See also tltc accompanying map.
riKLD OF THE ALMA. 339
In order to give effect to his desiie lor an ad- cilAP.
vance on the morrow, and to concert the move- '
ment with the naval chiefs, the English Connnan-
der liad, on the day whicli folIoM'ed the battle,
sent a note to Sir Edmund Lyons, requesting him
to come up to the English Headquarters at eight
o'clock the next morning;* but the peremptory
orders of Admiral Duiidas prevented Sir Edmund's
compliance with the lequest until after mid-day ij
and before Lord JIaglan and Lyons weic destined
to have their interview, counsels opposite to those
they judged right had not only prevented that
immediate resumption of the forward march which
they both deemed to be of great moment, but had
brought into question and seeming jeopardy the
M'hole plan and fate of the expedition.
^Marshal St Arnaud and Lord Eaglan had met ;
and the purport of what passed between them, as
conveyed by Lord Eaglan to Sir Edmund Lyons,
was this: Convinced of the policy of an immediate
advance, and an attack of the Northern Eorts, Lord
IJaglan pressed his o})inion upon tlie Erench jNfar-
shal, and 'proposed to him at once to advance on
' the Belbec, cross that river, and then assault the
' forts.' t
* Sir Ediimnd'.s recollection seems to have placed these cir-
cumstances at a time one day earlier than tliat which I assign
to them ; but his notes to Lord Kaglan, now lying before me,
sliow that he must have been mistaken.
+ These were orders founded on the report— a false report —
tliat seven Russian men-of-war liad slipped out of Sebastopol
and sailed (apparently) for Odessa. Lyons with tlie steam
squ.idron was ordered to pursue.
t The]\IS. memorandum mentioned in note. a7i(c, p. 8G8.
3-10 THE HALT ON THE
CHAP. In answer to this proposal lor an immediate
^^^' advance and attack upon the Northern Forts,
Marshal St Arnaud said that 'liis troops 'svcro
' tired, and that it could not be done.' *
Lord llaglan, as may be supposed, 'was disap-
* pointed by this answer/ and ' could not,' he said,
' understand it; for he knew that the troops could
'not 1)0 tired, and that there must be some other
' reason for the JNIarshal's answer.' -|-
After this, Lord Raglan had another interview
M ith INFarshal St Arnaud, at which he exerted his
power of persuasion in ' again urging the Frencli
' General to advance across the Belbec ; ' but in
reply the Marshal now said : ' He had ascertained
' that the Russians had thrown up strong earth-
' works on the banks of the river ; and, though
' he did not doubt that the Allies could force them,
' as they had the Avorks on the Alma, they could
* not afford the loss that would be entailed.' J
In his power of warding off or concealing every
access of despondency whicli might be hurtful to
the public service, Lord Raglan stood above other
men ; but even he could not hide — not, at least,
from his fi'iend Sir Edmund Lyons — the dejection
of spirits wliicli was brought upon him by Marshal
St Arnaud's refusal to go on with the campaign
as hitherto planned.§ And, indeed, the conjunc-
* Tlie lis. inenioriindum iiu'iitioiu'il in note, ante, p. 338.
t Ibid. My surmise as to what tlie other ren.son was will he
given, post, chap. v.
t Ibid.
§ Sir Edmund s:iys he 'found liim (Lord Eaglan) in Ijw
HELD OF THE AO[A. 3il
ture was a paiuful one. I have never leaiut that chap.
. Ill
the Marshal proposed any alternative plan ; and 1_
for a while the pause of the Allies was not a mere
halt. The enterprise stopped.
It might seem that now once more — and this,
too, on the morrow of a victory — the expedition
was in danger of coming to an end ; but if Lord
liagian had undertaken a venturesome campaign
in loyal obedience to the desire of the Queen's
Government rather than to his own judgment,
for that very reason perhaps he was the more
steadfast iu his resolve to overcome or elude
all obstacles : and the moment he found himself
encountered by tliis sudden recusancy at the
French Headquarters, he sought and perceived
a way by which his continued persistence in the
enterprise against Sebastopol could be made to
consist with St Arnaud's refusal to go on and
attack the North Forts. Lord Eaglan, indeed,
liad not yet abandoned the liope that this refusal
might be withdi-awn ; but, for the time, he had to
deal with it as a decision which was only too
likely to be adhered to : and accordingl}', but only
on the supposition that St Arnaud might really
persist in refusing to attack the North Forts, Lord
liaghtn proposed for consideration a plan of cam-
paign which would relieve the Allies from the
duty of having to march against the northern de-
fences, by transferring the theatre of war from the
spirits. On asking him the cause, he (Lord Raglan) said'
[then follows the account of Lord Raglan's second interview
with St Arnaud as above jciven].
342 THE HALT ON TlIK
CHAP, western to tlie southern coast. Of the counsels
' which ended in a resolve to adopt this new plan
of campaign I shall have to speak by-and-by, and
it is only in the process of accounting for the halt
on the Alma that I stay to glance at them here.*
Upon the question thus raised there was no
need for the Allies to come to their final and
absolute decision until they should be in the
neighbourhood of the Belbec ; but even whilst
still on the Alma, they apparently determined
tliat nothing but a return to the old plan of
attacking the North Forts should prevent them
from adopting Lord riaghm's conditional pro-
posal: and this determination carried them so far
towards an actual adoption of the measure, that
already their merely inchoate approval began to
govern their movements.
The way in which these changes of plan de-
tained the Allies on the Alma will now be per-
ceived. So i'ar as concerns the earlier period of
the halt, it resulted of necessity from Marshal St
Arnaud's refusal to go on and attack the North
Forts ; for between the time of the refusal and
the conditional acceptance of Lord Eaglan's al-
ternative proposal, the Allies wei'e without any
purpose sufhcing to guide tlu'ir steps; and when
at length, by ])ersisting in his refusal, the INLrrshal
eonstrnined the Allies to entertain a measure in-
volving the abandonment of the western coast, he
drove them to an alternative which still further
lengthened the halt.
* Soo 2^ost, cliai). V. See also the Llap.
FIKLD OF THE ALMA. 343
It is easy to see how the idea of abandoning the chap,
III
western coast carried with it a prolongation of the 1—
halt on the Alma. The number of the wounded
was so great, that the labour of getting them on
board could not but fill a good deal of time, and
it was of necessity that this operation sliould be
covered by the presence of a sullicient force.
Now, if the Allies had been firmly persisting in
their determination to march against the Sever-
naya or north side of Sebastopol, the western
coast would liave necessarily continued to be the
theatre of operations, and in that case it would
have been easy for them to go on with their ad-
vance the very day after the battle, leaving only
a detachment on the Alma to cover the embarka-
tion of the wounded. If, on the other hand, the
Allies should determine to abandon the western
coast, they could not well venture to leave there
an isolated detachment ; and the business of em-
barking the wounded must either go on without
the presence of any land forces to cover the opera-
tion, or else the wliolo Allied ai-my would have to
be detained lor the purpose ; and, since the aban-
donment of the wounded by the land forces was
an alternative too painful in its possible conse-
quences to be held worthy of adoption,* it fol-
lowed that to harbour the idea of giving up the
* With our present knowledge we may entertain no doubt
that the seamen and marines of the Allied navies might have
been well able to secure the safe embarkation of the wounded
without requiring the support of the land forces ; but, at the
time, there was not information enough in the Allied camp to
warrant such an assumption.
344 Till-: HALT ox Tin:
CHAP, intended iittack on the North Side, laul quitting Iho
., western coast of the peninsula, was to bring upon
the whole Allied army the necessity of a halt on the
Alma, and a halt, too, for such a time as would
suffice for getting the wounded on board ship.
So, although it is true that the cause of the
delay on the Alma was the unwillingness of the
Erench Marshal to go on with the advance against
the north side of Sebastopol, still, the halt having
once been resolved upon, its duration was made to
depend on the time it would take to have the sick
and the wounded put on board ship. The French
would have been able to get their sick and
wounded on board in one full day. On the other
hand, the number of the wounded English being,
as Lord Kaglan computed, just three times greater
than that of the Erench, and the ground whence
they had to be moved being very much farther
from the shore, it soon became certain that at
least two days of ceaseless labour would have to
be gone through before the English would be able
to bury their dead, aiul to get all their sick and
wounded on board.
Even within the two full days, the work could
not have been done without bringing to bear upon
it surpassing exertions. Nothing short of the
energy and the tenderness of the sailors would
have sufficed. Admiral Dundas devoted all
his medical ofliceis to the care of the sick and
wounded who lay on the field; and in the duty
of removing these sufferers, and bringing them on
board ship, as well as in that of landing storeSj
FIELD OF THE ALMA. 345
ho emplo}ed all liis boats, and no less than a CHAP.
thousand of his seamen* Every soldier prostrate
with wounds or sickness was a difticult load,
which had to be carried by the strength of men for
the distance of three or four miles ; but the sailors
toiled, and toiled with a generous, exuberant zeal
which left them no rest till the work was achieved.
Deep, indeed, as Lord Eaglan declared, was his
'feeling of gratitude' to the sailors fur these
kindly services ; and he owned that he liad been
singularly touched by observing the devotion with
which naval officers took part in the bodily labour
of lifting and carrying the wounded soldiers.+
Of the whole number of wounded English,
amounting, as we saw, in number to more than
sixteen bundled, a large proportion were so
stricken as to be helpless ; but besides, there
were the sufferers who lay upon the ground cast
down and disabled by mortal sickness, and of these
there were very many; for — baffling the hopes
which medical science had tried, one may say, to
harbour — the cholera had proved to be a pestil-
ence which was not to be warded off by the stir
and glory of battle.|
* Adniii-al DuiiJas to Admiralty, 27th OctoLer 1854.
+ Lord Eaglan to Duke of Newcastle.
* Captain Dacres, the connnander of the Sanspavell, and
his captain of the forecastle, were but two out of the number of
those seamen who genenaisly busied themselves in the kindly
duties which they felt to be imposed upon them by the pain-
ful scenes of the battle-field ; but they alone took out from the
tents (and buried as well as they could) the corpses of twenty-
eight men who had died of cholera during the night. — Letter
from Admiral Dacres, 19th October ISfiJJ.
in.
34G THE HALT ox THE
CHAP. Thus, then, tliu IniUle having L-iKknl before five
_!lll_ o'clock on tlie afternoon of the 20th of September,
the Allied armies remained halted on the Alma
until tlie morning of the '2od; and when it i.s
asked why, instead of thus tarrying, they did irot
resume their advance on the morrow of the battle,
the answer, we see, must be like to that which
showed why they did not press the enemy's re-
treat on the afternoon of the fight. The hinderer
was Marshal St Arnaud. But the halt having
once been resolved upon, it lasted two whole days
instead of one, because, though the French could
embark all their wounded men in one day, the
number of those who lay stricken on the English
part of the field was too great to allow of their
being dealt with in tlie lesser time.* So, not-
withstanding that the measure of halting on the
Alma was chai'geable upon jNlarshal St Arnaud,
still, on the 22d of September (having by that
time got his own wounded on board), he could
say, and could say with literal truth, that the
Trench army was able to advance when the Kng-
lish army was not. Accordingly, on the 22d,
whilst the English were still toiling hard at the
painful task of getting their wounded on board,
the Marshal suffered himself to write: 'The
' English are not yet ready, and I am kept back,
• just as at Baltchick, just as at Old Fort. It is
* By sonic it has been thought tliat commissaiiut dilficultiea
prevented tlie earlier advance of the Allies : but after consider-
ing the groun<ls on which that belief rested, 1 have not ac-
ce^ited it.
FIELD OF THE ALMA. 347
'true they liave more wuiuided than I luive, and chap,
' that they are farther from the sea.* AVliat '
' slowness in our movements ! War can hardly
' be carried on in this way. The weather is ad-
' mirable, and I am not profiting by it. I rage.'"f*
It being now seen that St Arnand's refusal to
advance on the position of the Northern Ports
was the cause of the halt on the Alma, there
remains the task of determining how far this
refusal was warranted. Of the strength of the The star
works which were thus arresting the Allies on
the morrow of their victory we shall have to
speak more fully by-and-by. Por the present, it
is enough to say that the main obstacle was the
Star Fort, an octagon earthwork, surrounded by a
ditch and glacis, looking down upon the open sea
towards the west and the Sebastopol bay on the
south ; that the Fort was not a work designed expe.iiency
against invaders coming from the Belbec, being u:^ '^^ '"*
commanded and looked into from the ground by
which the Allies might approach it;:J: tliat the
lire of the French and English ships could be
easily brought to bear upon it;§ that, whatever
accession of strength might be given to the ad-
jacent ground by the hasty labours of the enemy,
there were only twelve out of all the guns then
* Letter to his brother, 22d September.
t Private journal under same date.
i Sir John Burgoyne questions this, but he had not an
opportunity of effecting any sufficing reconnaissance of the
grouml ; and upon such a matter I can hardly refuse to treat
General de Todleben's statements as a safe guide. — 'Defense de
Sebastopol,' pp. 131, 230. § Ibid. p. 222.
348 THE HALT OX THE
CHAP. anuiiiL;- llio Fort itself which couhl ho hrought t(i
_J}^1_ hear upon the approaches hy which the AUies
inio-ht advance ; that tlie new, and as yet unarmed,
work whicli threatened tlie mouth of the ])elbec
was assaihible from the ships as well as hy the
,„.n-..iv,a land forces ; * and that, fhially, in the judgment
\LIm^ both of Lord llaglan and Sir Edmund Lyons, the
Kd.nuua Fort, with all its new adjuncts, was not an ob-
^^"'" stacle which ought to bailie a victorious army of
from 50,000 to 60,000 men advancing along the
coast, with the active and available support of
the attendant fleets.-f
soumiuess Time, at last, has apparently proved that the
inflrencea. inferences of Lord llaglan and Sir Edmund Lyons
were sound. More than that, it has shown that,
at a period wlien the Allies might have been
marching upon the Star Fort,+ Prince Mentschi-
koff had not only withdrawn to the south of
Sebastopol, but had deliberately renounced the
idea of venturing his army in any encounter on
the north of the roadstead.§ Therefore, if Mar-
shal St Arnaud had followed the counsels of Lord
♦ ' Defense tie Sebastopol,' p. 222.
t Mr Locli's MS. meinoianduni, quoted ante, ]). 338.
+ Viz., the 22d or 2od of Septciiilicr. After the departure of
Prince IMentschikoff in the night of the 24th, the Allies, thougli
not liable to be encountered at the Star Fort by any 'army,'
would still have had to deal, as we sliall afterwards sec, with
Korniloff and his sailors ; but on the 22d or the 23d, or even,
as I consider, on the 24th, the invaders might have niarclied
upon the position of tlie Star Fort without being met by either
the army or the .seamen.
§ After giving his reasons for regarding the position of the
Star Fort as untenable by the Prince's army against the Allies,
Geueral Todleben says : ' Having thus convinced himself thiit
FIELD OF THE ALMA. 349
Raglan and Sir Edmund Lyons, tlic Allies would chap.
• . • IIJ
Iiave occupied the north side of Sebastopol with- '
out encountering resistance, and having done this
they could have proceeded at once to execute the
main purpose of the invasion by destroying the
Black Sea fleet and the naval establishments of
Sebastopol.* Nor was even this all ; for there is
reason to believe that, by adding to their opera-
tions the mere occupation of a point on tho road
to Baktchi Seriii, the Allies would have secured
the surrender of the south of Sebastopol, and have
brought the campaign to an end."!*
With the victory of the 20th of September
Fortune offered Sebastopol to the Allies, but only,
as I have said, on condition that they would lay
instant hands on the prize.t That condition The first of
■'^ + . the ' lost
Marshal St Arnaud rejected, by I'efusing to go on 'occasioim
against the northern defences of the place. Wo
shall have to make a reckoning of the 'lost occa-
' sions ' which followed the battle of the Alma.
This one stands first.
' tliere was not, on this ground, any position wliere our troops
* could await the enem}' with some hope of success, and with-
' out being exposed to find themselves in a most critical situa-
' tion in case of failure, Prince MentschikolFsaw himself obliged
' to renounce encountering the Allies on the north of tiie road-
' stead. Recognising, at the same time, the necessity of re-
' organising his troops, of completing his supplies of ammunition
' and food, of reinforcing the garrison of Sebastopol, and de-
' termining the measures necessary for its defence, Prince
' Mentschikoff took the resolve of transporting himself to tho
• .south of Sebastopol.' — 'Defense de Sebastopol,' p. 215.
* The authority for this conclusion will be given post, chap. v.
t And for this conclusion also.
t Ante, last page of chap. i.
StfO ADVANCE TU THE BELliEU.
CHAPTER IV.
CHAP. On the morning of tliu 2od of Septeml>ci' tlie
'. Allies once more marched foiward ; and moving
theKatcC ^^^ the way along ground thickly strewn with
arms and accoutrements — tlie signs of the enemy's
haste to retreat — they descended at longtli into
The village the vallcy of the Katcha. The English were
oil its -^ .
banks. quartered atnid the gardens and vineyards of
a village all smiling witli signs of plenty ;
for although in broken furniture and emptied
chests, there were traces of Cossack spoilers, and
altliough, in tlieir terror, the villagers had fled,
still the happy-looking cottages, with their trcl-
lised and welcoming porches, the clierished fruit-
trees and especially the abounding clusters of tlie
vine, all seemed to speak of content and rewarded
industry.
Tiir- peoiiio Though the villagers had lied thev had not gone
viiiaye. far. A kuot of Englishmen inclined to ramble
into the country liad chosen the road leading east-
ward as the one most likely to withdraw them
from the familiar scenes of the camp. When they
had gone some way in this direction, they saw
ADVANCE TO THE BELBEC. 351
that, at a distance of some liundrcd of yards CHAP.
in front of tlieni, there was a crowd. At sight of
tlie strangers the crowd began to fly, hut after a
while, some of the people turned round, and,
little by little, were brought to attend to the
beckoning and the encouraging signs with which
they were met. After a while, the fugitive
villagers — for these were the people who formed
the crowd — began to grow somewhat less fear-
ful ; and at length, though often halting in
doubt, they came nearer, and then again nearer;"
but even when they had evidently made up
their minds to accept the proffered intercourse,
they yet stopped from time to time that they
might make prostrations and gestures in token
of submission.
These poor people were lurking about the neigh-
Ijourhood of the village in order to see or make
out what was going to befall their homes. Even
apart from kind motives, the Englishmen saw
the advantage of reassuring the villagers, and an
interpreter was fetched. When the people came
to understand that no harm would be done to
them or their property they became very grateful,
and some of them ventured back into their vil-
lage. From these villagers the English first came
to hear of the panic which had seized the Rus-
sian army in the midniglit after the battle ; and it
was here, too (as told in a former page), that tlie
simple natives excused their content by saying
that for three generations they had lived in peace
under the Czars.
the Bclbec.
352 ADVANCE TO THE RKLP.EG.
CHAP. The Euglisli at tlii.s time received a small ac-
' cession to tlie strength of their cavalry from the
landing of the Scots Grey p.
i.TdRa-- ]>ut M'hilst Ihe whole of the French, and the
1 ai's cavalrv .,, i>i-r-<Ti iti-
already on' maui l)ody ot tlic Lnoiisli armv, were estaluisliing
llieir quailers in the valley of the Katcha, Lord
Raglan — in the person of the General commanding
liis cavalry — was already in sight of Sebastopol,
and descending unmolested to the r>elbec. lie
had ordered Lord Lncan with the hnlk of the
cavalry and his troop of horse-artillery to push
forward, and take possession of the village of
Duvankoi, a village lying close to the Belbec, but
so far up the stream as to be upon the high road
which connected Sebastopol with Baktchi Serai.
Lord Lucan had to approacli the village by pass-
ing through a long defile which might have been
easily defended against cavalry ; but, although
watched by Cossacks, he was not opposed. The
village, when reached, was found to be in a nook
shut in between the bank of the river on one side
and precipitous heights on the other. Finding
the place unoccupied, Lord Lucan not only took
possession of it — that might have been done by
means of a picket — but kept liis troops down in
the nook for some hours. As far as was possible
in such a situation, he strove to prepare against
the event of an attack by placing three guns at
each entrance to the village, and some scouts on
the commanding hills ; but he did not conceal
from himself that his cavalry thus cooped down
must be powerless, and ex]-)oscd to destruction
ADVANCE TO THE BELBEC. 353
if attacked by infantry or artillery.* The enemy chap.
did not seize the occasion, and at dusk Lord Lu- ;_
can withdrew his troops to the high open ground
above ; "f" but certainly during some hours, our cav-
alry had been in peril.
Lord Lucan had been apprised that the Eussians
had had 2000 horse in the village of Duvankoi
just before its occupation by our cavalry ; and
when he rose from his bivouac on the morning of
the 24th, he saw bodies of Eussian troops both in
the direction of Sebastopol and near Mackenzie's
Farm ; but he was recalled into the general line
of march before the enemy's movements were yet
so developed as to enable him to make out their
scope and bearing. If his orders had suffered him
to remain in the neighbourhood of Duvankoi, he
might have found that the Eussians in force were
converging upon the very ground where he stood^
and that in a village close by Prince Mentschi-
koff was to establish his Headquarters. I
Excepting the cavalry, which Lord Eaglan had
thus pushed on a day's march in advance, the
whole of the Allied array bivouacked, as we saw,
on the Katcha.
* Lord Lucan seems to have thour;ht that the order to ' take
* possession of ' Duvankoi made it his duty to place his main
body in the village, and to keep it there during some 'few
' hours ;' for he speaks of the occupation of the village which
he had effected and continued till di;sk as an act which had
* sufficiently carried out his instructions.'
t This last measure, as might well be expected, was fully ap-
proved by Lord Raglan.
Z The village of Otarkoi. It was early on the following
morning that Prince Mentschikoff in person reached the village.
VOL. lU. Z
354
ADVANCE TO THE BELBEC.
CHAP.
IV.
Sunday
the 24tli.
New
obstruction
perceived
by the
French :
their re-
quest for
a little
delay.
On tlic moruing of Sunday the 24th of Septem-
ber, the Allies made ready to begin the march
which was to bring them to the Belbec, and place
them in presence of the Severn ay a, or northern
side of Sebastopol.
They were checked. The reported existence of
a fresh covered battery commanding the mouth of
the Belbec had been already put forward by the
French Commander as an obstacle which might
force the Allies to swerve from their purpose ; *
and now tliat the advancing armies were at last
on the banks of the Katcha, the Marshal's avowed
anxiety on the subject of this new field-work still
hung in the way of the enterprise. The French,
as we know, were on the right ; or, in other
words, next to the sea. Theirs was the part of the
Allied army which (if the advance should be con-
tinued in the direction hitherto followed) would
be brought opposite to the newly-formed battery ;
and, not unnaturally, they deemed it to be within
their peculiar and separate province to judge of
the importance of an obstacle which lay, as they
thought, in their path. Moreover, it had now be-
come known at the French Headquarters that the
enemy had sunk men-of-war across the mouth of
the Sebastopol roadstead.
At seven in the morning. Lord Eaglan received
a message from the French Marshal requesting
that the march might be postponed till ten o'clock,
not only for the purpose of considering the aspect
of affairs as altered by the sinking of the enemy's
* See ante, chap, iii., and post, chap. v.
ADVANCE TO THE BELBEC. 355
ships, but also in order to give time for a further chap.
reconnaissance of the field-work at the mouth of l,_,,
the Belbec.
The request was conveyed by Colonel Troclm,
who brought a note signed by himself, which he
left in the hands of Lord Eaglan. In English, the
note runs thus : ' Last night news reached the
* French camp that the Eussians had yesterday
' destroyed the entrance of the port of Sebastopol
' by sinking five ships and two frigates. Thence
' there results a new situation, on the subject of
' which the Marshal sends me to confer with his
' lordship Lord Eaglan. Besides, the Eussians
' have constructed in advance of Fort Constantine*
' a battery which directly commands the mouth of
' the Belbec, where the siege materials and the sup-
' plies have to be disembarked, and where the line
' of march is which the French army would have
' to take. Pending the expression of opinion on
' this subject by his lordship Lord Eaglan, the Mar-
' shal has adjourned the departure for some hours.
Lord Eaglan, of course, could do no otherwise
than yield to the request, more especially on the
last ground assigned ; for the field-work to which
it referred stood opposite — not to the English,
but — to the Marshal's line of advance, and (un-
less it were shunned altogether) would have to be
dealt with by the French.
* Colonel Trochu meant the * Star Fort. ' It was common at
the time in the Allied camps to call the ' Star Fort ' * Fort
' Constantine.' The real Fort Constantine, however, was a
sea- fort at the mouth of the Sebastopol bay.
356
ADVANCE TO THE BELBEC.
CHAP.
IV.
The advance
at length
resumed,
but without
any fixed
determi-
nation to
attack the
' North
' Side.'
Sobastopol
m .sight.
Marshal
St Arnaud :
liis state.
Hend in the
direction of
the march.
It seems to have been ultimately agreed that
the Allies should continue their march upon the
Belbec, though without committing themselves to
an attack of the Severnaya, or encountering the
new field -VFork; and accordingly, at about ten
o'clock the advance was resumed. Soon, crown-
ing the ridge of the hills which divide the Kat-
cha from the Belbec, and then, gazing eagerly
southwards, the two armies looked down on
Sebastopol.
On this summit, the Allies for a while re-
mained halted. Marshal St Arnaud quitted his
saddle and lay upon the ground. According to
the accounts of the French historians, he was
within a few hours of the period when the
physicians pronounced him to be suffering from
cholera; and although, at this time, his appear-
ance and manner spoke more of downcast spirits
than of mortal disease, it may well be imagined
that nothing other than bodily illness had made
him joyless at this the moment of his first look-
ing down on Sebastopol. He was unspeakably
sad. Contrasting the hard enterprise before him
with the work of happier days in the country of
the Arabs and the Kabyles, he sighed as men
sigh when they have to endure without hope.
Again the Allies marched forward ; but by the
time that their line of march was developed, an
observer who knew the ground might have in-
ferred, from the direction they took, that already
they were swerving from their purpose. Shun-
ning the imagined strength of the new field-work
ADVANCE TO THE BELBEC. 357
at the mouth of the Belbec, they began to bend chap.
away from the shore. '-
The "-round at this time traversed by the in- tiio track m
, . 1 • 1 1 -11 *'"^ Russian
vadiug armies was so thickly strewn with the .army.
marks of the enemy's hasty flight and confusion,
as to show that defeat had been lapsing into
ruin, and that that which had entered Sebastopol
was a hurried and fugitive crowd. Amongst the
things abandoned there was even that cargo of
kitchen implements which had suj)plied the table
of the Eussian Headquarters. The Allies failed
to read these signs, or rather they failed to read
them with that kind of understanding which
leads to clear inference and to accordant action.
Indeed, it would seem that they had hardly at
all treasured up and applied the narrative of that
Eussian panic on the Katcha whicli the villagers
had been giving them on the foregoing night.
Strange to say, that stand, or that mere sem- The proofs
° "^ . ' of its
blance of a stand, which Kiriakoff had made at shattered
state not
the close of the battle on the Alma, had raised weii mas-
tered by
up a veil so effectual, that it still served to screen the Allies
the Eussians from the eyes of their invaders.
No fragments of the wreck, no accounts of eye-
witnesses, were enough to countervail the effect
which Kiriakoff had wrought upon the counsels
of the Allies, by showing them a front for some
minutes, and causing them to believe that the
retreat which he was covering must be a retreat
in good order.*
* The reason why the few minutes' stand made by Kiriakoff
imposed so effectually upon the Allies was this : it happened
358
ADVANCE TO THE BELBEC.
CHAP.
IV.
The invaders
descending
into the
valley of
the Belbec.
Reconnais-
sance by
Lord
Cardigan.
Grave im-
port of a
resolve to
shun an
attack of
the ' North
' sid«.'
The invading armies now descended into the
beauteous valley of the Belbec. Tliere was little
that could yet be seen of the Eussian troops.
Lord Cardigan, with a couple of squadrons, re-
connoitred a pass towards Sebastopol in the
direct front of the English lines, and reported
it impracticable, there being, he said, a marsh in
front, then a causeway, and then a battery of
heavy guns supported by a strong force of in-
fantry and some cavalry.
To go hardily on with the old plan of the inva-
sion, undertaking to carry at once whatever the
enemy might have prepared by way of defence
for his Star Fort, — this, however difficult, or how-
ever easy, was, at all events, an enterprise delib-
erately contemplated beforehand, and of such a
kind as to be strictly consisting with the charac-
ter of the expedition ; for the attack was one in
which (by aiding in the capture of the works at
tlie mouth of the Belbec, and the entrenchments
connecting them with the Star Fort) the naval
forces of the Allies could take a great part. Be-
sides, the condition of things was such that, if the
Allies should determine to shun this encounter,
their caution would be far from restoring them
that his line of retreat was so far diagonal, tliat when lie took
up Ills second position, some two miles in rear of the Alma
heights, he was no longer opposite to the French line of battle
(as he had been during the action), hut to the English ; and
the consequence was, that his jiresence in order of battle, much
aided by the nature of the ground, masked the confusion of that
part of the Russian army which was retreating from its con-
flict with the English.
ADVANCE TO THE BELBEC. 359
to the approved and recognised patlis of scientific chap.
warfare. On tlie contrary, a tardy wariness in '
that direction could hardly now fail to be impru-
dent. The expedition had gone too far to leave
open a choice between risk and safety. The
choice was between two or more kinds of grave
danger. This night, though the soldiery were
gladdened by the beauty of the vale, and the
wealth of the gardens and the villas, it could not
but happen that the chiefs would be busied with
anxious counsels.
3G0 THE NORTH SIDE OF SEBASTOPOL.
from tho
north.
CHAPTER V.
CHAP. At the time when the deliberations of tlie Allies
• in Bulgaria resulted in their determining that
of'oiSng t'^^6 western, and not the southern, coast of the
slbastoroi Crimea should be looked to for the place of their
landing, it was not so much settled in words, but
rather taken for granted, that this resolve carried
with it the ulterior design of moving on south-
ward along the same western coast, and operating
against the northern defences of Sebastopol. The
assumption was a natural one ; for, because of
the Sebastopol bay, it was only from the north
that an invader remaining established on the
western coast could attempt an attack.
Long before, and prior indeed to the actual
commencement of the war. Captain Drummond
of the lletribution had ventured to give firm
counsel upon this subject ; and the knowledge he
had acquired by lying at anchor in the roadstead
of Sebastopol enabled him to speak with great
weight.* Both Captain Drummond and Captain
* See the Plan. Since the now published statements and
comments of General de Todleben tend very strongly to sliow
TL.VN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE. 3G1
Willes (wlio was acting with him at the time of chap
the survey) conceived themselves able to report '. —
decisively in favour of an attack upon the Star
Fort as a means of achieving the great object of
the Allies ; * but if, even before the invasion, they
were warranted in fixing upon the Severnaya or
' North Side ' as the true point of attack, much
more was it now to be concluded in favour of such
a choice, since the Allies, by their successful land-
ing, followed up by the result of the battle on
the Alma, had fastened already upon that very
part of the coast from which they could conveni-
ently assail the Star Fort ; and moreover, it was
fairly to be reckoned, that if the Allies should go
straight to their end, without at all turning aside,
or interposing fresh marches between themselves
and their prey, the momentum they had gathered
from their victory might carry them through the
defences without being put to a siege.
Bivouacking now on the Belbec, the Allies The tuw
'-' _ Imd now
were at last within gunshot of the fortress they come for
^ . '' a final
had come over sea to confront; and, the period decision
in which it had been possible to keep the ques-
that the ' North Side ' was the true point to attack, it cannot
but be interesting to the friends of Captain (now Admiral Sir
James) Drummond to see the words in which he reported to
the above effect : ' I think that, on carrying the position of the
' " E " Fort ' [the Star Fort is marked " E " in Captain Drnm-
mond's plan] 'the place would fall immediately.' — Captain
Drummond's Report, 9th January 1854.
* Captain Willes says, in his Report : * I think it is quite
' possible to destroy the arsenal with time and 20,000 soldiers,
' artillery, &c. Tlie attack en the South Side should be a
' feint.'
362 PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE.
CHAP.
V.
The Sever-
naya or
north side
of Sebas-
topol.
tion open being close to its end, they were called
upon to determine whether they would at once
prepare to deliver the attack, or give up their old
plan of campaign.
It is now therefore time to see what there was
in front of the Allies which might be calculated
to turn them from the execution of their original
design.
On the northern side of the Sebastopol bay,
and facing the sea-forts which cover the town
and harbour, there were not only other sea-forts
of great size and power, but also some barracks,
some magazines, and a factory worked by the
Government. This aggregate of buildings, or the
quarter in which tliey stood, was known amongst
Kussians by the name of the Severnaya ; and the
English have been accustomed to call it the
' North side of Sebastopol,' or, in language more
short, the ' North Side.' If once the Allies could
make themselves masters there, they would be
able to deal so lieavily with the town and arsenal
IIS value to of Scbastopol, and would have it so completely in
their power to burn every ship in the harbour,
that thenceforth the main object of the invasion
might be regarded as an object attained.*
But even these were not all the advantages
wliich might be expected to flow from a resolve
to attack tlie Star Fort. By reason of the prox-
* I rest tliis assertion upon the authority of General de Tod-
leljeu.— 'Defense de Sebastopol,' vol. i. p. 239. The General
(in accord with Drumniond, ante, p. 361) states hie conclusion
upon thia pcint in decisive, unhesitating terms.
PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NOKTH SIDE. 363
imity of that field of action to the roads which chap.
converge near Mackenzie's Farm, the plan of '.
operating against the north side of Sebastopol
was compatible with measures for seizing the
enemy's lines of communication* And this was
a priceless advantage ; for although, in regard to
material supplies, Sebastopol for the time might
be sufficing to the needs of the Kussian army,
Prince Mentschikoff was wholly dependent upon
his lines of communication for the reinforcements
which he believed to be of absolute necessity to
him. General de Todleben has good means of
knowing the degree of stress which must have
been put upon the Russians by the loss of their
lines of communication ; and it is his judgment
that, at this time, the establishment of an Allied
force on the road to Baktchi Serai must have
brought the campaign to an end.-f-
The forts, barracks, storehouses, and factory, The plateau
. overhanging
which thus came to be of great M'orth in the the North
, ^ p Side.
eyes of the strivmg nations, were at the foot of a
high plateau surrounded on three sides by water.
Along the northern boundary of the plateau there
flowed the stream of the Belbec ; on the west, its
base met the Black Sea ; and on the south, where
the buildings were placed, it fronted the great
bay of Sebastopol. The sea-forts were not so con-
structed as to be the means of defence against an
* Not oiilj' with tlie north, but with the south-east of the
Crimea, where there were 10,000 men under Khomatoff.
t Expressed in liis book, and — very positively indeed— ia
conversation with me.
Kort
3G4 PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NOIITII SIDE.
CHAP, invader coining down upon them by land from
'^' the north ; but on the high ground above, though
still at a distance of only a few hundred yards
from the bay, there was the Work already referred
to — a Work ill-contrived and dilapidated — which
The star the English have called the Star Fort. The work
had been constructed in the year 1818, with a
view to secure Fort Constantine, and the otlier
great sea-forts which lined the north of the road-
stead, from being taken in reverse by marines or
other forces landing on the west coast ; but it
stood in the path of any invader approaching
Sebastopol from the Belbec, and could therefore
be brought into use as a means of defence against
liira. It was an octagon, having sides of which
each was from 190 to 230 yards long ; and, of its
eight angles, every other one was supplied with
a little bastion or caponiere, having an earthen
parapet, whilst three out of the four remaining
angles of tlie octasjon were furnished with small
bonnettes and barbettes, each taking three pieces.
At the flanks of the bastions, the lines of what
would otherwise have been the curtain were so
interrupted as to provide means of obtaining a
flanking fire from some small guns placed in
casemates. The profiles of the bastions gave 14
feet of height with 10 of thickness, and the
other parts of the fort had a height of from 4 to 7
feet, with a thickness of from 3 to 7 feet. The bas-
tion which looked towards the roadstead was re-
trenched at its gorge by a work called a cavalier.
The fort was surrounded by a ditch 12 feet deep
PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE. 365
and 18 feet broad, with revetment in masonry and en a p.
a glacis. It was covered on its south and south- ^'
eastern sides by two lunettes, but both of these
faced the water, and were of no important use
against an enemy advancing from the Belbec. Of
the 47 guns which armed the work, only 12 could
be of service in the expected attack from the
north. The fort was commanded, and even looked
into, from the heights towards the north.*
In and near this work, from the day of the Eudeavoui-3
landing, on the 14th of September, down to the sians^fter"
evening of the 24th, the time of which we are sept. to
speaking, the Hussians had toiled night and day, the fort
1 ■ 1 /. n and the
and with a force of, at one time, some 1500 work- riateau.
men. Their object was, not only to repair and
strengthen the Star Fort itself, but also to pro-
vide generally for the defence of the plateau
against an enemy advancing from the Belbec.
By those who know that these hurried works
went on under the direction of Lieutenant- Colonel
de Todleben, it will be easily inferred that they
* It may be right to say that in the above accouut of the
Star Fort I have not implicitly followed the description con-
tained in the text of General de Todleben's work ; but my
words, I believe, will be found to agree with the plans which
accompany his book. Those plans agree very well with the
description contained in the admirable work which I have fol-
lowed, the work of Gendre (' Materiaux pour servir,' &c.), but
not with the words of General de Todleben's book. General de
Todleben's book purports not to have been written, but edited
by him ; and I imagine he would be much more likely to allow
mistakes to occur in the words of the narrative compiled under
his auspices than to suffer any grave faults to apjjear in the
elaborate maps and plans of fortifications which form so valu-
able a portion of the work.
36 G PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE.
CHAP, were planued with a consummate skill; but
.. what even he found means to achieve in ten
days could not but fall very short of what was
needed.
However, he threw up works on each flank of
the fort in order to strengthen and extend the line
of defence, taking care that all the approaches
(some of which had before been quite out of harm's
way from the fort) should now be liable to be
swept by fire. Besides this, he erected two bat-
teries on the crests towards the north-west, with
the design of keeping off the enemy's ships ; and
two, if not three, out of the nine guns which
ultimately armed these batteries were so placed
as to command that part of the coast which lay
towards the mouth of the Belbec. The earthwork
prepared for the reception of those two guns was
the apparition described to Lord liaglan in the
morning by Colonel Trochu, and threatening, as
we have already seen, to scare the Allies from
their purpose. It does not appear that Todleben
foresaw the effect which these two guns would
have upon the counsels of the Allies. His general
object was to take care that no ships should come
within range without incurring fire ; and he did
not, it would seem, entertain any notion that, by
refusing to the Allies the absolutely peaceful
possession of the mouth of the Belbec, he might
drive them to abandon their plan of campaign.
He connected both of these north-western batteries
with the Star Fort by means of trenches, which
were to be lined by men using their musketry
PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SHDE. 367
In order to prevent the Star Fort from being chap.
looked into by the enemy, a great effort was made '
to increase the height of the parapet ; but under
the weiglit of the earth laid for this purpose upon
one of the old parapets the revetment of the
scarp gave way, and a breach was thus made by
the defenders themselves. One of Todleben's
objects was to throw up works which might pre-
vent the enemy from turning the Star Fort on the
eastern flank, but for the execution of this part of
his plan there was no time.
By the morning of the 25th there were alto- ounsavaii-
gether twenty-nine guns in battery and available defence.
for the defence against the expected attack from
the north. Amongst these were the nine pieces
which now armed the two new north-western
batteries, including the two 24-pounder carronades
which commanded the coast towards the mouth of
the Belbec. These two batteries, however, were parttiiat
liable to be destroyed by the guns of the Anglo- been taken
French fleet ;* and the trench connecting one of in attack '^
them with the fort could be enfiladed and taken F..rt.
in rear by fire from the same quarter. •j* Indeed,
the position of the ground and of the Eussian
works was such that in every stage of an attack
undertaken against the Star Fort, the seamen and
the ships of the Allies would have been able to
take a great part.J
In order to cover the retreat of the Eussians,
some of their ships were placed in such positions
• Todleben, 'Defense de Sebastopol,' vol. i. p. 233.
+ Ibid. J Ibid.
368 PLAJ^ OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE.
C 11 A P
V.
Forces
available
for tlio
defence.
as to be able to sweep with their broadsides the
slopes ou the north of the roadstead.
The form of the ravines descending from the
Star Fort was such that upon two, if not three, of
the approaches from the side of the Belbec, the
assailants might come up to the ditch without
first incurring a cannonade of any great might or
duration.*
With regard to the forces available for the
defence, it may be said that if the AlHes had
advanced against the Star Fort on the morning of
the 25th they would have encountered there and
on the gi'ound adjoining a battalion of militiamen, "f
a company of sappers, and so large a body of
sailors — withdrawn, for that purpose, from the
ships and from the defence of the South Side — as
would bring up the whole number of combatants
to 11,000. 1 The sailors were, for the most part,
the liositum ill armed, some of them having old flint-and-steel
muskets, and others, it seems, only pikes or cut-
lasses. This was the force which, extended along
a front of a mile, was to defend the fort and the
plateau against a victorious army of from 50,000
to 60,000 men, supported and actively aided by
their fleets. The defenders, however, were com-
manded by one whose name will be long illustri-
ous in the annals of llussia. For the present, it
* In the 'Defi-'iiso de Scbastopol,' General de Todleben un-
dertakes to show elaborately, and in full detail, the power and
duration of the fire to which the assailants would be exposed.
f I continue to use the term 'militia' as a word for distin-
guishing what the Russians call their ' reserve ' battalions.
t 11,350.— Todleben, voL i. p. 227.
The force
defending
and 25th
Sept.
Admiral
Koniiloff.
PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE. 3G9
suffices to say of Admiral Korniloff, that he was a c u a P.
chivalrous, resolute, and devoted seaman, who, ^'
with hardly a hope of any better success than that
of an honourable death, had determined to defend
the plateau and the fort to the last extremity.
Of the reception so prepared for the Allies, I Policy of
am content to say only this much, because, after tiie^nortb
all, it so happened that the Star Fort was never
assailed; aud although there is use in inquiring
what would have been the probable result of an
attack upon 'the North Side' from the direction
of the Belbec, it chances that this very question
has already received an answer which comes with
so much authority, and is, at the same time, so
well supported by detailed statement and labo-
rious demonstration, that it is well to give the
conclusion without reproducing, in this place, the
voluminous materials of proof on which it is
rested.*
We saw t]]at the officer who planned and di-
rected the works of defence was Colonel de Todle-
ben. He it is who has now pronounced that the
plateau and the fort could not have been success-
fully defended against the attack which the Allies
had the means of making.f The situation of
* The passages in which General de Todleben maintains his
conclusion will be found in pp. 230-233, 238 and 239 of his work ;
but I do not reproduce them, because they fail to deal with the
really disputed question— i.e., the question whether the posi-
tion could have been advantageously defended by an army.
The argument in favour of that last view {i.e., Sir John Bui-
goyne's) will be found in the Appendix, No. XII.
t Todleben, 'Defease de Sebastopol,' vol. i. pp. 230-233.
VOL. m. 2 A
370 PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE.
CHAP, tlie defenders, he says, notwithstanding all they
^' had done, and notwithstanding their heroic re-
in the solves, was nothing less than desperate ; * and he
TodTeb^n ; declares that the complete success of the expected
attack by the Allies would have been inevitable.f
He adds — and there were reasons which gave
great importance to that part of the question —
that their success must have been speedy. J These
conclusions he of course founds on his own com-
plete knowledge of the defences as seen from
within ; and it would not of necessity follow that
the weakness of which he was cognisant would
be visible to the Allies. But, then, General de
Todleben goes further. Supposing the Allies to
have made full use of even those restricted means
of observation they had, he says they must needs
have learnt that the attack was feasible. §
And, lest it be said that this, after all, was only
the conclusion of an Engineer officer standing on
the sea-cliff, and thence undertaking to say how
far the defences could be judged of from the ships,
it must be repeated that the conclusion to which
General de Todleben says the Allies ought to have
come was the very same as that to which Lord
in that of Kaglan and Sir Edmund Lyons did come in fact.
lanami'Sii Sir Edmuud, as commanding the in-shore squad-
ron, would have been called upon to take a great
])&vt in any attack carried on along the coast, and
therefore his judgment was that of a man prepar-
ing to act upon it. He, no less than Lord Eaglaa
• Todelbei), 'Defense de Seliastopol,' vol. i. j). 30.
t Ibi'l. p. 233. t Ibid. p. 232. § Ibid. p. 239.
E. Lyons.
PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE. 371
was conviuced, as we saw, that after the Alma chap.
the true policy of the Allies required an imme- '__
diate attack upon the Star Fort.
The Allies were not ignorant that the posses-
sion of the North Side would at once enable them
to cannonade the enemy's shipping.* Nor again
did they fall into the error of supposing the Star
Fort to be of itself a formidable work.-f- Indeed The objec-
• 11 ii'i i'i 1- tions that
it may be said that the hindrances which stood in were urgea
11 p 1 1 • 1 against
the way of the enterprise were all of such a kind attacking
•^ J- the North
that they must have been as clearly apparent to side,
the minds of general officers whilst planning at
Varna as now they were to the eyes of men scan-
ning the work with their field-glasses. It is true,
as we saw, that towards the north-west of the
Star Fort a field-work had lately appeared, which
bent round the shoulder of the hill, and in such
a direction that two if not three of its guns, at a
range of two miles, might bring their fire to bear
upon the waters at the mouth of the Belbec ; but
the use of the spade and the pickaxe has been so
long known in the world, and the crust of the earth
has been so frequently used by man as a means
* See the 3d clause of Sir John Burgoyne's Memorandum,
post, p. 395. It is difficult for an Englishman to help thinking
wistfully of the course things might have been likely to take if,
the French claim to precedence being out of the way, the Eng-
lish had been on the right. In that case, Lord Raglan and Sir
Edmund Lyons would have been operating, as it were, side by
side, and the enterprise against the Star Fort would have given
a good occasion for showing what can be done by the closely
combined action of land and sea forces.
t See Sir John Burgoyne's Memorandum, post, p. 395, in
which he admits it was 'by no means formidable if insulated.'
372 PLA.N OF AITACKING THE NOUTH SIDE.
CHAP, of sheltering himself whilst engaged in efforts to
^' harm his assailants, that if the Allies were to turn
aside from a well-weighed plan of campaign at
the sight of a newly-made battery, they would not
only disclose a flexibility scarce consistent with
the pretensions of aggressive States, but would be
conceding to the power of the Defence, as com-
pared with the power of the Attack, an ascendant
which does not belong to it. Certainly, it was
possible that by a gun in the new battery, dis-
charged at a range of two miles, a vessel might be
struck whilst engaged in bringing stores into the
mouth of the Belbec ; but it was not with a notion
of being baffled by a contingency of this kind that
the venturesome enterprise of the invasion had
been planned or begun ; and the Work which thus
threatened the entrance of the Belbec was not only
open to attack by the land forces of the Allies,
but was also so placed that the naval forces of the
French and English ships could have taken their
part in its capture.
Again, it was said that the position which the
Eussiaus would have to defend on the North Side
was only a mile in extent, and that therefore their
main strength might be concentrated with power-
ful effect upon a comparatively small space of
ground.* It was also argued that, from the mo-
ment of the landing, the Russians must have in-
ferred that the invaders intended to attack the
Severnaya or North Side, and tliat, therefore,
there was no hope of surprising the enemy by au
* Sir John Burgoyne's Memorandum, j^ost, p. 395.
PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE. 373
attack at that point.* So far as they went, these chap
two arguments were sound, but, taken alone, tliey '
had not sufficient cogency to warrant the aban-
donment of a well- matured plan of campaign.
Yet again, it was argued that the capture of the
Severnaya or North Side alone, though involving
the means of cannonading the Russian ships and
their dockyards, would not of necessity carry with
it the entire possession of Sebastopol.f To this
objection the answer is twofold : for, first, it is
clear that the capture of the Severnaya or North
Side alone would have enabled the Allies to attain
at once the main object of the invasion ; but,
secondly, as we have already seen, the operations
against the Severnaya might have been easily
accompanied or followed by a measure which
(unless General de Todleben errs) must have
instantly given the Allies the whole of the prize
they were seeking. :|:
By far the gravest of the obstacles to the plan
of assailing the North Side was the want of a safe
harbour on that part of the neighbouring coast
which was north of the Sebastopol bay. It was
said that the attack might take time, and that,
pending the operations, the fleets might be so
driven from the coast by stress of weather as to
put the Allies in peril for their supplies. Of
course this fear was one which applied to the
idea of attempting any landing at all on the
western shores of the Crimea ; and, since it had
* Sir John Burgoyne's Memorandum, jwsl, p. 395.
+ Ibid. J See ante, p. 369 et seq.
374 PLA.N OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDK.
CHAP, been so far set at nouglit that, in despite of it, the
.. ..i Allies had both landed and established themselves
in the country, it was hardly perhaps opportune
to revive the objection at a time when the in-
vaders had made good their footing in the penin-
sula by a decisive victory. The Allies did well
to regard the want of a harbour as a grave evil ;
but apparently their most prudent mode of allow-
ing this care to weigh upon their counsels would
have been by treating it as a motive for shorten-
ing to the utmost the anxious interval, and deter-
mining— ay, even, if need be, at a painful cost of
life — to carry the works of the Severnaya with a
peremptory despatch, whilst yet by title of victory
they seemed to have might on their side. So
inextricably were the Allies engaged in the ex-
pedition, and so deeply were they conmiitted in
the face of Europe to the duty of achieving their
end, that, whatever may have been their wisdom
originally in resolving to touch the Crimea, the
driest prudence now seemed to command that they
should follow up the victory with swiftness, and
always in that venturesome temper which was
the only one fitted to their enterprise. For refuge
as well as for glory they needed the port of
Sebastopol.
Sir John The plan of going straight on to attack the
tirc'^|?eltf Star Fort found its greatest and most gifted
opponent in Sir John Burgoyne ; and if it be
asked how he brought himself to think the-
obstruction so formidable, the explanation is
this : — Instead of regarding the Fort as a work
oiii)onent.
PLAJi OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE. 375
wliicli (along with its adjuncts) would be only chaf.
defended by its mere garrison, lie looked upon it
as a part only of an extended line of defence.
He looked upon it as marking the dominant
feature of an entrenched position which, in his
judgment, might be advantageously defended by
an army ; and then, having formed that opinion,
he went on to infer that a like opinion would
govern the decisions of the enemy, and that by a
whole army accordingly the position would be
defended.* There, he erred. There was no in-
tention on the part of the Russians to attempt to
defend the position by means of an army ; and it
must be added that the mistake of believing the
contrary was one that might have been cleared
away by a careful reconnaissance.
But if the relinquishment of the North Side
was not to be justified upon military grounds,
there was still this to sa}'' for the measure : — it
was a way out of trouble. We have seen that Rccapitu-
when, the day after the battle, Lord Raglan pro- mei.t of the
posed, to St Arnaud ' at once to advance to the objection
' Belbec, cross that rivei-, and then assault the the 'Nortii
' forts,' the Marshal answered that ' his troops
' were tired, and that it could not be done.'"f-
We also learnt that on the following day, the 22d.
Lord Raglan was ' again urging on the French
' General to advance across the Belbec,' and, for
* In Sir John Burgoj'ne's 'Military Opinions,' p. 238, the
expressed ground of objection to an attack of the Star Fort was,
that the position would be defended by an ' army. ' It was
Burgoyne himself who put the word in italics.
+ Statement of Sir E. Lyons, ante. chap, iii.
37 G PLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE.
CHAP, once in his life, was cast into a state of 'low
^' ' spirits,' by hearing the Marshal reply, ' that he
' had ascertained that the Kussians had thrown
' up strong earthworks on the banks of the river ;
' and though he (the Marshal) did not doubt that
' the Allies could force them, as they had the
' works on the Alma, they could not afford the
• loss that would be entailed ; ' * and, finally, we
were enabled to perceive the way in which this
refusal of the French to go on with the campaign
as originally planned, was the cause which
induced the Allies to halt — to halt with the
whole of their forces — for two clear days on the
Alma.f
It must now be added, that the further efforts
of Sir Edmund Lyons to induce the Marshal to
agree to an attack on the position of the Star
neconnais- Fort wcrc attended with no success. Upon
Mimui'ii ' " hearing from Lord Eaglan that the Marshal had
Lyons. j^Heged the new earthworks overlooking the
Belbec as an obstacle not to be faced, Sir
Edmund put himself on board a small steamer,
and ran in so close as to be able to reconnoitre
Failure of effcctually. He then ascertained that the newly-
vonTto''' appearing works were of the kind represented by
stArnami. tlic Marshal, but that they had not yet been
armed. Sir Edmund hastened to report the re-
sult of his survey to the French Commander, but
* Statement of Sir E. Lyons, a7ite, cliap. iii.
+ Instead of leaving mcrel)' a division to cover the embarka-
tion of the wounded, an expedient wliich would have consisted
perfectly with tlie plan of advancing at once to the attack of
the Star Fort. See ante, chap. iii.
FLAN OF ATTACKING THE NORTH SIDE. 377
could not persuade liim to resume the idea of chap.
marcliinix acraiust the Star Eort.
At first — and this was the cause of Lord Rag- Lord
lan's dejection — the wliole enterprise seemed to peTuUar
be threatened with ruin by the refusal of Marshal foriessln-
St Arnaud to go on in the execution of the plan evusofa
of campaign witli which the Allies had set sail, command
But the English General was by nature so con-
stituted that no man could be better qualified
than he was to lessen to the very utmost the
acknowledged evil of a divided command; for,
besides that his devotion to the public service
was so entire as to exclude all thought of self, he
was free from the vanity (if vanity it be) which
makes a man desire that a great event should be
traceable to his own conception : and he was not
accustomed to ponder over warlike devices in such
a way as to be likely to conceive a violent pre-
dilection for one plan, or a violent dislike of
another. He plainly believed that, for an army
endued with the strength which a victory always
gives, an inferior or even rash plan, carried
through with good will by each of the com-
manders, would serve the cause better than any
other plan (liowever good in itself) which failed
to win the cordial approval of both the chiefs.
He was, therefore, well qualified to deal with the
emergency in which the Allies would find them-
selves placed if the French should persist in their
unwillingness to assail the Star Fort.
The evil was occasioned by the fact that, at
a moment when (from causes which will be
378 COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP, afterwards spoken of*) the Frencli army was
^- temporarily disqualified for enterprise, that same
Dilemma arniv cliaaccd to be the one which (by reason of
in whicli •>
tiic Allies its position on the right of the Allied forces, and
were placed. '- "
therefore opposite to the Star Fort and its out-
works) was called upon to perform an arduous
duty. This accident, if so one may call it, being
the true root of the evil which threatened the
fate of the invasion, it followed that a way of
escape from it might be found, if the hitherto
adopted plan of campaign could be replaced by
one which, for the moment, would present the
labouring oar to the English instead of the
French. Blending a technical phrase with words
of common parlance, a man might say that the
condition of the Allied army was this : — If, as
first intended, it were called upon to operate ' by
' its right,' it would still be under the palsy
which affected the French Headquarters. If,
on the other hand, the Allied army were to
operate against the enemy ' by its left,' it w^ould
instantly shake off all numbness deriving from
Marshal St Arnaud, and would practically come
under the leadership of the English General.
The infer- It was possiblc to imagine a plan of campaign
had b^en""^ wliich would work this change. Though custom
Sectfi and foreseeing prudence have made it the practice
defences of the great European Powers to obtain in peace-
toK^i:^^" time full accounts and plans of the fortresses
belonging to rival States, this (in common with
many other of the warlike duties attaching upon
* At the close of this chapter.
PLAN OF THE FLA.NK MARCH. 379
her in peace-time) England had neglected; and chap.
it happened that in the case of Sebastopol, there
had been a like neglect on the part of the French
War Office. Neither France nor England were
authoritatively informed of the state of the laud
defences of Sebastopol.
In the year 1835, Colonel Macintosh had given i.ycoionei
to the world an account of the then state of the
land defences of the place ; and he had brought
to bear upon this task not only a sufficing care
and labour, but also so much sagacity, and so
sound a knowledge of the military art, that to
this hour it is curious to see how the destined
strife for the Malakoff had been foreshadowed
in a book which at the opening of the war was
almost twenty years old.* "When the war began
to impend. General Macintosh imparted further
expositions of the subject to the authorities at
the Horse Guards ; and it is now certain that the
body of information and suggestive comment
which he supplied would have been a wholesome
study for the Allies ; for, although it would have
* On the 16th of December 1834, General (then Colonel)
Macintosh, in a memorandum addressed to our ambassador
at Constantinople, wrote : ' It appears that the works intended
' to enclose the town on this side (it is now quite open) are
' meant to consist in a strong enceinte of revetted bastions.
' They are now laid out, and quarries opened to carry them
' on. . . . The new works are to extend as nearlj- as pos-
' sible in the direction e, e, e, and will completely cover the
' town and harbour. At present the inner harbour is com-
' manded from the height d.' By looking at the accompanying
copy of the sketch which Colonel Macintosh sent with his
memorandum of 1834, it will be seen that the ground there
designated as ' the height d ' is the site of the Malakoff.
380 COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP, ijeen necessary for tliem to make wide allowance
V. '' ,
— for the changes which the hand of man might
have wrought in a period of twenty years, the
great features of the ground must needs be the
same, and the plan of the defences which (accord-
ing to the showing of General Macintosh) the
Russian engineers had traced out on paper was
one so cogently dictated by the nature of the
ground, tliat it might well be regarded as a
useful indication of what the defences would
be even after a lapse of years. It was natural,
however, that, being impatient of their strange
want of knowledge concerning the actual state of
the land defences, and yearning after fresher
information, the Allies should have given too
little care to the result of old surveys and in-
quiries.
Our army is not constituted upon a plan which
entices its officers to the pursuit of warlike studies
or warlike inquiries having only a contingent
usefulness ; and the power which England may
be able to exert in appealing to arms depends a
good deal upon the readiness with which she may
be able to break down mere professional barriers,
and bring to bear upon the great business of war
the abounding zeal, energy, and skill of her whole
people.
i.yMr It was from the book of a young Scottish
traveller that the Allies derived what knowledge
they had of the state of the land defences at
Sebastopol.
Mr Oliphant had been gifted with an almost
Dliiiliant
PLAN OF THE FLANK MARCH. 381
instinctive power, which showed liim from afar chap.
where fields of action were opening ; and he was '
so prone to decide and dart forward whilst others
were only pondering that, however many there
might have been with wishes and plans like his,
yet commonly of late years he has been the first
to alight upon the scene of coming events. So it
happened that, before the home statesmen of the
day had begun to take the alarm, this restless,
sagacious traveller had half divined the war,
and already was pacing those ridges and knolls
and ravines npon which, a little while later, his
country was to rivet her thoughts. For some
time, it had been the policy of the Czar to with-
draw Sebastopol from the eyes of Europe ; and, in
general, no traveller was suffered to enter the
place. But an obstacle of this kind was sure to
be overcome by the spirit of enterprise ; and Mr
Oliphant not only found means to enter Sebas-
topol, but succeeded in informing himself of the
then state of the land defences on the south side
of the harbour. Eeturning to England, he quickly
made known the result of his observations, and
caused to be published these words : —
' But of one fact there is no doubt, that how-
' ever well fortified may be the approaches to
' Sebastopol by sea, there is nothing whatever to
' prevent any number of troops landing a few
' miles south of the town in one of the six con-
' venient bays with which the coast as far as Cape
' Kherson is indented, and, marching down the
' main street (provided they were strong enough
382 COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP, 'to defeat any military force that might be op-
J ' posed to them in the open field), sack the town,
' and burn the fleet.' *
This report not only did much to evoke the
desire for an enterprise against Sebastopol, but
also caused men to see that, at all events up to
the period when the question of the Holy Shrines
began to assume a grave aspect, little had been
done to the land defences ; and that, whatever
obstacles might have to be encountered by an
army attacking the place from the south, those
obstacles, at the time of Mr Oliphant's visit, were
not of a kind to make a formal siege needful.
Moreover, as there was no proof that works
on a great scale had been going on during the
last eighteen months, there seemed to be fair
ground for hoping that, so far as concerned the
existence of regular fortifications in masonry, the
land approaches to Sebastopol might be nearly
in the state they were in when Mr Oliphant saw
them.
Before he left England, Lord Eaglan did not
fail to give himself the advantage of a personal
interview with Mr Oliphant, and afterwards with
Oliphant's fellow-traveller, Mr Oswald Smith.
The result was, that the impression created by
* Oliphant's ' Russian Shores of the Black Sea,' p. 260. Mr
Oliphant's report was accurate. With the exception of throw-
ing up a work near tlie water's edge, which was more properly
an adjunct to one of the sea-forts than a part of the land de-
fences, nothing had been done at the time of his visit towards
fortifying the main town of Sebastopol on its south side. Jlr
Oliphant's book was published on the 15th of November 1853
PLAN OF THE FLANK MARCH. 383
the passage iu Mr Oliphant's book was strength- chap.
ened. Thenceforth the probability of finding X"_
Sebastopol weakly fortified on the land side never
ceased to be kept in remembrance ; and it was
only the supposed want of a convenient landing-
ground on the southern coast of the Crimea which
afterwards caused the Allies to discard for a
time the plan of attacking the place from that
side.
At the time of the earliest deliberations on the Lord
subject, Lord Eaglan had been disposed to think orifinai^
that Sebastopol ought to be attacked on the south
side ; and although he had ceased to dwell on
the idea from the time when the west coast was
chosen for the place of landing, it recurred to him, its revival,
as we saw, on the morrow of the battle, when he
found himself encountered at the French Head-
quarters by a refusal to attack the Star Fort. He conception
then conceived that if the French should persist n-arcii.
to the last in their refusal, he at least might avert
that utter cessation and collapse of the whole en-
terprise which their determination threatened to
produce by persuading them (as a substitute for
the old plan which they were thus abandoning) to
join with him in marching across the country to
the south coast, and there establishing a new base
of operations, from which to attack Sebastopol on
its south side.
The hazardous character of such an undertak- objections
ing as this has been masked, as we shall here- tiw'Vian
after see, by a strange coincidence, and by the ^*^°p®"
singularly happy immunity which that coinci-
;i84 COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP, clence brought with it ; but the phui now proposed
__J was nothing less than that, in the presence of a
Eussiau army understood to be concentrated in
Sebastopol, the Allies should break into a slender
column, with a depth of many miles, and in that
state defile for two whole days or more (through
a forest unknown save by maps) round the eastern
side of Sebastopol. It would seem at first sight
that an army undertaking such a task would lay
itself open to the danger of being cut into two or
more pieces at the pleasure of the Eussian Com-
mander.
Some reckoned, indeed, that the defeat which
the enemy had suffered might be expected to
render him so tolerant that he would suffer the
flank march to go on under his eyes without
daring to undertake the seemingly easy task of
bringing it to ruin ; but to hope this was to found
a great deal upon the moral effect of a victory ;
for the condition of troops and waggon-trains
defiling through forest and mountain roads is ex-
actly such as to give to a defeated army on their
fiank an occasion to recover its boldness and self-
respect by effecting successful though petty at-
tacks upon the more helpless portions of the long,
trailing column. Besides, it is obvious that if
the enemy's prostration was so complete as to
make him capable of suffering the Allies to defile
by their left and march round him, it was still
more likely that, in the event of a prompt attack
upon the Star Fort, that same prostration of spirit
would bring about the fall of tlio Work. Indeed,
TLAX OF THE FLANK MAliCIL 385
one stroiiii- reason for discarding; the plan was, CHAF.
that if the Allied army should once turn aside to '
make a circuitous march, instead of going on
straight with its purpose against the Star Fort, it
would lose a great deal of that priceless momentum
which the victory of the Alma had given it.
Again, the configuration of the ground in the
neighbourhood of the INIackenzie Heights was of
such a kind that if, as was proposed, the Allies
should march round to Balaclava and the Cher-
sonese with the whole of their forces, they would
so forfeit their freedom of action that (except by
undertaking a second invasion) it would become
impracticable for them, however strong they might
be, to press upon the enemy by offensive opera-
tions in the field.* Shut back in a narrow dis-
trict, they would be liable to undergo the attacks
of the Eussian Commander whenever he might
find it convenient to assume the offensive, and
yet would be debarred from exercising a corres-
ponding power themselves. The invaders had no
acquaintance with the country into which they
were going, except what they got from their map ; f
and although, so far as it went, this guide was
not an unfaithful one, the language of tlie en-
graver, who represented with lines and shading
* This, as we shall hereafter see, was effectually proved in
the spring of 1855, when, in the hope of finding an escape from
the almost intolerable predicament in which the Allies had
placed themselves, the French Government wns about to under-
take a fresh invasion of the Crimea.
+ A reprint, under the auspices of Major Jervis, of the map
prepared by the Russian Government.
vol,. II r. 2 B
38 G COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP, tile southward declivities ot" tlio ^NFaelvenzie range,
. did not have the effect of warning the Allies that
there was there an impregnable position, and tliat,
if they should leave it to the enemy, they Mould
concede to him irrevocably an advantage of the
greatest worth, by giving up their power to attack
him in the open field, and compelling themselves
to assail him, if ever they should assail him at all,
in his lines of defence at Sebastopol.
And last, it must be observed that for the
Allies to avoid the attack of the Star Fort, which
stood within gunshot before them, and to move
away to the south coast, was to fly from a task
measured out, understood, well defined, and go
off to confront things unknown. The weakness
of the Fort itself as an aid to defence had been
perceived by the Allies ; * and although they did
not know that it had been abandoned by the
Russian army to the care of the seamen, they
were aware that it would be defended, if de-
fended at all, by a force suffering under the
depression of a lost battle, and having to attempt
a stand with an arm of the sea in its immediate
roar. Yet to the task of seizing this fort, and so
at once gaining the north side of Sebastopol, and
the means of destroying the enemy's fleet and
dockyards, they were going to prefer the unex-
plored forest and tlie mountain roads, with the
necessity of having to debouch into a plain
where the presence of a Eussian army might
be expected, and of afterwards being forced to
* See Sir Jolin Ijiir^'oyue'.s McnioriMKluin, j'ost, p. 3P5.
PLAN OF THE FLANK MARCH. 387
conquer for themselves new means of communi- chap,
cation with the sea. On that, of course, their '
very existence was to depend ; and then, again,
in the distance there would still lie before them
the prospect of having to force the immensely-
strong position of the Sapoun^ ridge ; for until
that ridge should be carried, they could not even
begin to attack the southern defences of Sebas-
topol — defences of which, at this time, they knew
very little. They had learnt, indeed, that on its
land side, some two years before, the place was
open ; but in knowledge of what might since
have been done for its defence their minds were
almost blank.
The dangers and evils thus attaching to the
plan of the ' flank march ' were of the gravest
kind ; but the truth is, that the unwillingness of
the French Commander to persist in the plan of
attacking the north side of the place had brought
the affairs of the Allies to such a state that, sup-
posing his reluctance to continue, very little free- Ti.e iittie
dom of choice could or would remain to Lord choice'iiu
llaglan. He could not, of course, insult the Kagia'l
French army by marching across its front to at-
tack a work which was straight o])posite to their
lines, and away from those of the English. And,
although Lord Eaglan judged it to be his duty
to uphold, to the Inst, the expediency of going
on with tl^e old plan of campaign, and attacking
the North Fort, he also felt that there M'as a limit
to the urgency which could be appropriately ex-
erted in that direction ; for it was evident that
388
COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP.
V.
Reasons
teiKling to
justify tlio
resort to
the flank
march.
to be beyond measure persistent in pressing and
pressing the French Marshal to undertake an
attack against liis declared will and judgment
was not only a course which held out small pro-
mise of good, but one which, if too far pursued,
could liardly be otherwise than unbecoming, of-
fensive, and impolitic. The thought of abandon-
ing the expedition was not to be borne ; and,
although it may be judged that next to an attack
on tlie Star Fort, the most politic mode of con-
quering the enemy's stronghold was by means of
field operations carried on upon his lines of com-
munication, yet the impatience of the English
at home was so great, was so closely pointed to
one object, and was, moreover, so hotl}^ shared
by their Government, that a resort to any plan
of campaign, however wisely conceived, which
avoided a direct attack upon Sebastopol, would
have been almost looked upon as a flinching
from duty.
Well, but if, for this reason, field operations
could not well be proposed as a substitute for a
direct attack upon Sebastopol, then what choice
was left? The truth is, that the unwillingness
nf the French to attack the north side of Se-
bastopol had brought the Allies into straits so
hard that, with all its rashness, the plan of defil-
ing round the east of Sebastopol might be re-
'Tarded as the least of the evils from which a
o
choice could be made. Rightly looked at, ' the
' flank march ' — for so the movement is called —
was a perilous, a desperate expedient, by which
PLAN OF THE FLAXK MAKCII. 389
— that lie miglit avert a collapse of the whole uu- chap.
dertaking — Lord Ragian sought to find an alter- ' .
native for the enterprise declined by the French.
From causes which will be spoken of presently,
the French army, without any fault of its own,
was, for the moment, paral}'sed ; and, the English
army, on the other hand, being ready for action,
and under a General resolved to force on the en-
terprise, there was great temptation to clutch at
a plan which would relieve the French army
from all immediate demand on its energies, and
cast the load on the English. The plan of the
flank march fulfilled these conditions ; for it
spared the French from the task which had
seemed to await them on their right front, and
invested the English General with the leader-
ship and the virtual control of the proposed
operation.
But, although it was as an escape from a Ligiitin
dilemma that the flank march is best to be jus- Ragian re-
tified, I do not represent that Lord Piaglan him- aiteiu:itive
self thought ill of the measure. AVithout ever maRi.. "
wavering in his opinion that the victory on the
Alma should be followed up by pursuing the old
plan and attacking the Severuaya or North Fort,
he yet thought that he saw such good features
in the alternative plan as to be able to fall back
upon it with a cheerful contentment. Apparently
he was not much impressed with the hazardous
character of the flank march ; and, on the other
liand, he certainly thought that, if once the Allies
should be established on the south coast, they
300 COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP. wuulJ there be on the best ground fur attacking
' SebastopoL*
Sir John Foi* the purposG of informing himself upon any
question of military engineering, Lord Eaglan Lad
at his side an accomplished and gifted adviser.
Sir John Burgoyne was a general of engineers now
serving on the Staff of the army which Lord Rag-
lan commanded. His experience of war went back
to the great days. It began with the first year of
this century at Malta. In 1806 he was serving
in Sicily. He was commanding engineer with
General I'luser's expedition to Egypt, and was at
the assault on the lines of Alexandria, and the
siege of Eosetta. He was with Sir John Moore
at jNIessina and in Sweden in 1808, and was with
him the same year in the Peninsula. He was at
Coiunna. He blew up the bridge of ]]enevente
in the presence of the enemy. He was with Sir
Arthur Wellesley in 1809, and attached to the 3d
(Picton's) Division. He was at the passage of the
Douro. He served in the lines of Torres Vedras.
He blew up Fort Conception in presence of the
enemy. He was at Busaco, at the first siege of
Badajoz, at Elboden, at Aldea del Ponte, and at
the siege and capture of Ciudad Podrigo, where he
* ' I have always been disposed to consider tliat Sebastopol
' should be attacked on the south side, and Sir John Burgoyne
' leant strongly to the same opinion.' — Private letter from Lord
Raglan to the Duke of Newcastle, 2Sth September 1854. This
must not be understood as implying — for that would be con-
trary to the fact — that Lord Raglan, when once landed on the
western coast of the Crimea, did not anxiously desire and pre-
fer that there should be au attack on the north side.
PLAN OF THE FLANK MARCH. 391
was present at the assault. He was at the second ch a p.
siege and capture of Badajoz, and was present at '
the assault and escalade of the castle. He was
comnianding engineer at the siege and capture of
the forts of Salamanca, and at the battle. He was
commanding engineer at the capture of ISIadrid,
and the lietiro, and also at the siege of Burgos,
where he was wounded. At Vittoria he had a
horse shot under him. He was wounded at the
assault of St Sebastian. He conducted the siege
of the castle of St Sebastian as commanding en-
gineer. He was at the passage of the Bidassoa,
the Nivelle, at the Nive, at the passage of the
Adour, the blockade of Bayonne, and the repulse
of the sortie. He was at New Orleans, and was
with the force despatched to Portugal in 1827.*
He had, therefore, a vast experience, connecting
his name with a glorious period of England's
history ; and the value of this advantage was
not, as so often happens, in the least counteracted
by failure of energy. On the contrary, Sir John
Burgoyne was gifted with a vigour of mind which
made him in that respect the equal of those who
were young. Furrowed by years, and the sheer
labour of great wars, he still showed what mettle
tliere was in the generation of men with which
England began the century ; for neither Egypt,
nor the retreat to Corunna, nor the cares of Torres
Vedras, nor the business of all the great sieges — •
Ciudad Kodrigo, Badajoz, Burgos, St Sebastian —
nor yet the discomfiture of New Orleans, had been
* Harl's .Vnny List.
392 COUNSELS ENDING IX TlIM
CiiAP. able to iini)riiit upon his features the marks of
^- painful anxiety. To hiyh intellectual power he
added the firmness of a reasouer who liolds that
there can be no sect in mathematics, and that
(jpinions carefully formed must not he dominated
by mere results. As might be expected, he was
master of the science of the military engineer;
but his nund, ranging freely beyond his own
branch of the service, had become stored with the
many kinds of knowledge which concern the
whole business of war. He wrote with clearness,
with grace, and so persuasively that, having a pen
in his hand, he was liable perhaps to be drawn
into error by the cogency of his o\N'n arguments.
He was daring and resolute; and, since his mind
had been formed at a time when England was not
only in a robust and warlike condition, but also
in some degree careless of the lives of common
soldiers and workmen, it is probable that he could
have easily brought himself to make a great sacri-
fice of life for a great purpose ; and the power to
do this, where a strong place has to be taken, i.'^
one of no little worth. jMoreover, it is believed
that Sir John Burgoyne was not without that
wholesome ambition which, if the command of an
army had chanced to fall to his lot, might have
impelled him to great acliievenients.* It is
possible that l)ecause he was the commanding
engineer with Eraser's expedition 1o Egypt, and
* He was at one time so nearly the senior general officer serv-
ing under Lord Raglan, that, under possible circumstances,
he might have succeeded to the command, 'i'hc Duke of New-
castle imagined that Ijeeause Burgoyne was an engineer officer,
PLAN OF THE FLANK MATtCII. 393
at the sier-e of BiirTOS, aud because he was at New c n A p.
Orleans, and because he Avas advising in the ^
business of trying to take Sebastopol at a time
when the place did not fall, therefore some, in
estimating his quality as a general, might con-
demn him, after the manner of the Athenians, lor
not being fortunate ; and supposing it to be in-
sisted upon (as it woidd be by the more accurate
Moderns) that a mere charge of lucklessness is no
honest answer to a question concerning the capac-
ity of a general, the objector, wlien thus driven
home, might venture perhaps a surmise that Sir
John Burgoyne's sureness of judgment was liable
to be endangered by his too indisciiminate reliance
upon the processes of close reasoning; for a method
like that is most apt to lead man into fallacies,
whenever he applies it to questions of sucli a kind
that they need to be solved by the instinctive, the
divining power, or even by coai'se sagacity.
Still, the tenor of counsels, appearing at first
sight to result from a too studious method of solv-
ing warlike problems, might be traceable, after
all, to the nature of Sir John Burgoyne's position
at the English Headquarters, rather than to the
original bent of his mind; for ]ie who, without
holding a command, was called upon to give
advice likely to be accepted at the Frencli Head-
quarters, as well as by his own chief, was obliged
to make proposals of such a kind tliat he could
it would have been matter of course for liim to decline tha
command of the army, but upon that point Lord Kaglan un-
deceived the Secretary of State in very decisive terms.
394 COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP, support iliein in argument; and that very neces-
. sity would be enough to prevent him from strik-
ing upon one of those daring yet happy concep-
tions which can be originated and pushed to great
issues by a sole commander, although they are
wanting in those smooth, placid features which
would best recommend them to a council of war.
Of course, it was in the nature of things that
the judgment of a man deeply versed in the
business of sieges should be more or less warped
by his science; and that, advising on the conduct
of an enterprise much dependent on swiftness of
action and ou prompt use of the blessing of victory,
the skilled engineer might be too ready to enter
upon a war of entrenchments ; but Sir John
Burgoyne had so much breadth of view, and so
general a knowledge of the warlike art, that he
was as little likely, perhaps, to err in this direction
as any other officer of the same calling in the
French or the English camp.
Hieoi)inion. Now, Sir John Burgoyne not only held that
the project of an attack upon the south side of
Sebastopol had many and great advantages over
that of assailing the Star Fort, but even brought
himself to believe that, for the sake of being able
to exchange the one plan fur the other, it would
be wise to front all the hazard of marching the
Allied armies to the east of the Sebastopol road-
stead, and thence round to the south of the place.
His opinion was known to his chief; and when
Lord liaglan perceived that the reluctance of the
French to attack the Star Fort was strong, and
PLAN OF THE FLANK MAUClf. 395
firmly rooted, he liastened to obtain for the alter- chap.
native plau which had occurred to him the '
sanction and persuasive support of Sir John
Buro'oyne. Accordingly, on the morrow of the neisre-
1 1 1 *i 1 ,r--r, quested to
battle on the Alma, he requested Sir John to put put it in
..... -^ . ^ writing.
his opinion in writing ; and, in the course of the
same day, the English Commander was furnished
with this memorandum :—
Memorandum.
'Camp on the Alma, 21*-^ Sept. 185-1.
*I would submit that, unless some impeding cixcum- sir John
' stances occur wliicli cannot now be foreseen, the combhied fiemofau-'
' armies should at once move round to the south side of "^um
' Sebastopol, instead of attacking Fort Constantino,* by
' wliich the following advantages may be anticipated : —
' 1. That instead of attacking a position naturally strong
' and of limited extent, to which a powerful support will
' be given by Fort Constantine,* which is a permanent
' fortification, though by no means formidable, if insulated,
' the enemy would have to defend a very extensive line,
* divided by valleys, and from every information, very im-
' perfectlj'-, if at all, entrenched, and whicli would probably
' be forced rapidly.
' 2. As the a<lvance is from the north, our attack will
' rather be expected on that side, and not on the south.
' 3. Even supposing the Fort Constantine * to be taken,
' although it will open tlie shipping, dockyard, &c., to
' cannonading, it does not insure entire possession of the
' important establisliments until after a second operation,
' which may still require to move round to the south, while
* By Fort Constantiue Sir John Burgoyue means tlie Star
Fort. Fort Constantine was one of the sea-forts, but at this
period of tlie invasion the name was often applied by mistake
to the Star Fort.
39G COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP. ' tlie enemy will retain to the last free and oj-en conimuni-
V- ' cation to tlie ])lace.*
'4. There is eveiy reason to believe, from the api)earance
' of the map?, and what may be expected to be the forma-
' tiou of the ground, that there is a very strong position
* between the sea at BahacLiva and along the valley of the
' Tchernaya, that would most elliciently cover the Allied
* armies during the operation, Init is too extensive to be
' taken up by the garrison.
'5. That the communication with the fleet, which is, in
' fact, our base of operations, would be far more secure and
* commodious by the small harbour of Balaclava and the
* bays near Chersonese, than on the open coast to the
' north, and with the advantage of a good road from Bala-
* clava to the attacks, and a very flat country to pass to
' them from the bays near Chersonese.
' G. Under ordinary circumstances such a movement
' woidd have the efiect of exposing the communication of
' the army to be cut off; but in this case the idea is, to
* abandon the communication from the north altogether,
* and establish a new one to the shipping in tlie .south,
' which would be nlo^■ed round for that purpose.
' J. F. BuRGOYXE, Lieut. -General.'
Having completed this menioraudum. Sir John
Plan of tlie Bui'goyne was requested by Lord liaglau to go to
iiropoumk'd the Freucli Headquarters, and there propound the
tHAnmud: phin of the flank march. He obeyed. His inter-
view with Marshal St Arnaud took place in the
presence of the jNIarshal's chi(;f of Ihe Staff and
of General Bizot, tlie officers in command of the
* Possibly some words may have been here left out or nus-
AViitten, for, as actually worded, this last suggestion seems to
be not only an error, but an inversion of the real state of the
case. The attack of the North Side was the one which would
have been compatible witli plans for seizing the enein3''s lines
of communication, wlillst the flank march was on the contrary
a final aljdication of all power to operate in tliat way.
PLAN OF THE FLANK MAKCH. 397
Engineers. Some other Staff officers were in the chap,
tent. Wlien Sir John Burgoyne had expLained ^-
the proposal recorded hy ]iis memorandum, and
liad answered the few questionings whicli were
addressed to him, tlie Marshal at once, and with-
out at all seeking counsel from the officers about
him, declared, as Sir John understood, that he
approved tlie plan, and was willing to join with
Lord Eaglan in tlie determination to carry it into
effect ;* but it must not be understood that these and by him
Avords carried with them an unconditional de- '^"^"*«'"^'*
cision. The Marshal apparently understood the
proposal exactly in the same sense as that in
which Lord Raglan had meant it to be submitted
to him ; and what his answer really imported was,
that if he should persist in his objection to attack
the North Fort, then, and in that event, he would
consent to resort to the flank march. At all
events, it is certain that the question of adopting
the plan of the flank march remained open until
a later period. ■[•
Yet, even as early as the time when the Allies
still lay on the Alma, the plan had won so much
favour, that already, as we saw, it acted upon the
arrangements of the commanders, preventing them
from leaving a detachment to cover the embarka-
* Letter from Sir John Burgoyne.
+ See Marshal St Arnaud's journal, under date of the 23d
and 24tli September. Lord Eaglan fixes the evening of the
24th, on the Belbec, as the time wlien tlio measure was adopted.
— Despatch to Secretary of War, Sept. 23. See also, post, an
extract from a private letter to the Duke of Newcastle, written
on the night of the 24th.
398 COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
LH AP. lion of the wounded, and, in that way, prolonging
^- the halt.
And now, in tlie evening of the 24th of Sep-
tember, whilst the troops were establishing their
quarters among the gardens and tlie villas on the
Belbec, the Allies took their final resolve.
LoniR.i-- Lord Eaglan, with some of his Staff, went to
ference with tlie Camp of the French Headquarters. The
St Aniaud iutcrvicw was not a long one. Lord Piaglan, in
evening of few words, and for the last time, submitted that
the Allies should go on with their original plan
of campaign, and assault the works on the north
of Sebastopol. Marshal St Arnaud once more
declined to agree to this. He said that the de-
fences of the Star Fort had revetments in masonry,
and that he would not undertake to attack such
a work without laying formal siege to it.* This
answer was treated as negativing all further idea
of attacking Sebastopol from the north. f As
regards the course which, in these circumstances,
was to be resorted to. Lord Raglan, as we saw,
had himself proposed the alternative plan ; and
^farshal St Ai'naud, it seems, though not with-
* Iiiforiiiatioii from an ofTifcr present. In a private letter to
the Duke of Newcastle, written just after tliis confeience, and
dated, 'On the Belbec, 24th Sojit., night,' Lord Eaglan says :
' We crossed to the Belbec this afternoon, and moved to the
' lieiglits above it. I was anxious to have gone farther, but the
' French thought otherwise.'
+ The mouth of the Belbec being commanded by the new
battery thrown up near the Star Fort, it was conceived that no
base of operations could be constituted in that region without
first carrying the Star Fort, and that, consequently, any attacks
on the Fort must be of a siimmarv kind.
PLAN OF THE FLANK MARCH. 399
out some hesitation, liad already made up his chap.
tlie flank
iiarcli.
mind to accept it.* On tliis subject, therefoie, '__
neither one nor the other of the two commanders ^.';l^^i'„
had need to use words of persuasion. Tliey HI^qI^^
agreed to attempt the flank march. -f*
* On the 24111 tlie llarslial wrote in liis jnivato jonrnnl :
' We start at eleven o'clock. We shall turn the positions anil
' the batteries by the left.' Lord Raglan's view seems to have
been that the Marshal's assent to the Hank march did not so
much result from positive approval of the measure as from re-
luctance to go on with the original jdan of attacking the Star
Fort after hearing of the new works which commanded the
mouth of the Belbec. In his private letter of the 28th of Sep-
tember to the Duke of Newcastle, Lord Raglan, after speaking
of Sir John Burgoyne's memorandum respecting the flank
march, says : ' The Marshal did not veiy readily adopt the idea
' in the first instance ; but when he found that the mouth of the
' Belbec was commanded, and that strong works were erecting
' in front of Fort Constantine ' [meaning the Star Fort] ' which
' would impede the use of the river, he assented to the proposition
' without hesitation.' I imagine that the hesitation which Lord
Raglan hei'e ascribes to St Arnaud must have shown itself after
Burgoyne's interview with the ILarshal, and before the discovery
of the new field-work overlooking the mouth of the Belbec.
t Statement by an officer present. Writing that same night
of the deliberations between the French and the English Head-
quarters, Lord Raglan says : ' We shall move again to-morrow
' morning, and we have nearly determined to attempt the
* attack of Sebastopol from the south side, abandoning our com-
' munication with the Katcha.' — Private letter to Duke of
Newcastle, dated, 'On the Belbec, 24th Sept. 1854, night.'
In qualifying his language by the word 'nearly,' Lord Raglan,
as I understand him, was adapting his statement to the fact
that the execution of the plan was to be subject to the result
of the reconnaissance he was going to undertake on the morrow.
He did not, in any other sense, mean that the resolve was
otherwise than final; and as the intended reconnaissance was to
be in the course of the flank march, and, so to speak, a part of
it, I can make, without qualification, the statement in the
text to which this note is appended.
400 COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP. DuriniJ tlie conversation, ^Tarslial St Arnaud
' sat rigidly up in an armed chair, and to some who
M^rsi"d observed it his bearing conveyed an impression
stArnaiui. ^^^^^ -j^q wishcd to givc to the interview an ap-
pearance of formality ; but Lord Piaglan perceived
the truth. He had no sooner left the French
camp than he said to one of liis Staff, ' Did you
' observe St Arnaud ? — he is dying.'
This was the last time that the two chiefs con-
ferred upon the business of the campaign. When
Lord Iiaglan visited the French Headquarters on
the followinfT mornino- he found that the Marshal
was no longer in a condition to be able to take
part in affairs.
The (iccisioM The dccision the chiefs had come to was this : —
tiie ciiiefs that unless the reconnaissance which Lord Ea<?lan
caiiie.
was to make on the morrow should disclose good
reasons for changing the plan, the English army
first (to be followed in due time by the French)
should endeavour to push round the head of tlie
Sebastopol roadstead by gaining the ^Mackenzie
Heights, with intention to descend thence into
the valley of the Tchernaya, and recover com-
munication with the sea by seizing the harbour
of Balaclava.
I'robai.io At the time, it was hard to account for the
Ma'rs*iiars '^^ jNFarshal's unwillingness to go on with the task
I"ss'to"°' of assailing the Star Fort, as well as for his ready
star Fori: acccptauce of an alternative plan which, for the
moment, would throw the leadership of the Allied
army into the hands of his English colleague ;
and Lord Kaiilan acknowledired to Sir luhnund
PLAN OF THE FLANK MAKCIL 401
Lyons that he could not understand the jNIarshal's cii AP.
recusancy. But time has since thrown some light :
on what was then obscure ; and to me it seems
that the theory which best explains the counsels
of the French Headquarters at this time is the ob-
vious, the simple, the shallow one — the one which
traces them to the bodily condition of Marshal
St Arnaud.* Without any accurate knowledge of
the successive maladies from which the Marshal
was suffering, or of tlieir singular intermissions,
it is easy to see that, in the interval between the
battle of the Alma and his final determination to
consent to tlie flank march, he was grievously ill iiisbodiiy
in health, and was, from time to time, prostrated
by his sufferings. But just as, in his African
campaigns, he had more than once bravely re-
solved to drag his suffering body out of hospital
that he might be acting with his regiment in
some approaching engagement, so now, exerting
himself to hold on in spite of his bodily state, he
persisted in keeping his command. In the con-
dition in which he was it was physically impos-
sible for him to perform the laborious duties of
a general who has to provide for the attack of
such a place as the Star Fort. If it be said that
he might have resigned his command, the answer
is, that that was exactly the end he was striving
* This was the solution which Sir Edmund Lyons afterwards
adopted ; but he also intimated that, at the time of the Mar-
shal's refusal to go on against the North Forts, the state of his
bodily health was not so far known to him (Sir Edmund) or to
Lord Raglan as to enable them to see that that was the cause
of the evil.
VOL. in. 2 C
402 COUNSELS ENDING IN THE
CHAP, to avoid. With liis old spirit of resistance to
^'' bodily weakness, he clung to his command, and
apx^arently with the more tenacity from the
time when he suspected that measures had been
secretly taken to provide for the event of his
becoming unable to remain at the head of the
army. So when, as a substitute for the attack
of the Star Fort, there came the proposal to resort
to the flank march, he could see that the measure
was one which averted the immediate necessity
of his resigning the command by shifting the
stress of duty in the Allied army from its right
to its left, and thereby enabling him to do now
again what he had so happily done once before
when he lay struck down by illness * — that is, to
leave the virtual leadership of the whole expe-
dition for the time in the hands of the English
Commander.
This way of explaining what passed is the
more to be welcomed since it tends to disperse
the seeming cloud that was thrown upon the
French army by the counsels of its chief, and
recognises that singular power of fighting against
bodily sickness which was one of the most in-
teresting features in the character of ^larshal
St Arnaud.f
If this linal determination to turn aside from
* During the voyage. See ' Invasion of the Crimea,' vol. ii.
chap. XX. of Cabinet Edition.
+ Since I wrote tlie above, I have had an opportunity of
seeing that General dc Todleben ascribes the avoidance of the
Star Fort to the same cause — the maladies of the French
Marsha}.
PLAN OF THE FLANK .MARCH. 403
the Star Fort was in one sense a mere continuance chap.
of St Arnaud's former refusal to marcJi on and ^•
attack the woik, still it took place under different Tiieavoid-
*• _ ance of the
conditions, and in circumstances which crave it sur Fort
' *-' was the
the character of a distinct resolve. Thus re- fccomiof
the lost
garded, it has to be ranged as the second of the ' wcasiona.'
' lost occasions ' which followed the battle of the
Alma.
APPENDIX.
NOTE I.
The Strength of the Eussian Army engaged cn
THE Alma.
When I published, my narrative of the battle of the
Alma, the first volume of the ' Defense de Sebastopol ' had
not yet made its appearance ; but now that I am revising
my statements, I might certainly accept, if I chose, the
tempting guidance afforded me by a work which is not only
sanctioned officially by the Eussian Government, but car-
ries with it besides the immense recommendation of having
been compiled under the auspices of General de Todleben.
How readily I could follow such an authority upon ques-
tions of numerical strength T showed when I wrote my
account of the battle of Inkerman ; and it might seem at
first sight that, if only for the sake of consistency, I ought
to be content with the like guidance in revising my account
of the Alma ; but there are several considerations which
interpose to prevent me from doing so.
General de Todleben was present at the battle of Inker-
man, taking in it a part of great moment ; and it was natu-
ral that under such circumstances a narrative of the action
40G APPENDIX.
written under his auspices should be upon an extended
scale ; that it should be enriched by the statements of num-
berless officers who had fought side by side with the hero
commanded to frame the record ; and, finally, that it should
be prepared with much expenditure of labour. Accord-
ingly, that account was supported by figures purporting to
give the exact strength of each Eussian regiment engaged ;
and upon the whole, I felt that reposing, as I did, the most
implicit confidence in the personal honour of General de
Todleben, I might venture to accept the figures he appeared
to have sanctioned, or, at all events, might do so as a rule,
making only those little corrections which the occurrence of
some trivial errors appeared to render necessary. I acted
accordingly, and have seen no reason to regret my decision.
Eut the narrative of the battle of the Alma contained in
the ' Defense de Sebastopol ' is far from fulfilling the con-
ditions which were observed in the account of ' Inkerman.'
General de Todleben was not present at the battle of the
Alma, and appears to have been unsuccessful in obtaining
the information necessary for giving a good account of the
action ; but (for the purpose at present on hand) the main
defect of the record is that it does not (as was done in tho
case of Inkerman) give the strength of each regiment sepa-
rately, but simply mentions a total in what one may call a
loose cursory way, saying that the troops concentrated by
Prince Mentschikofi" on the Alma were ' nearly 33,600,'
' pr^s de 33,600 ; ' and by any one turning to the Appen-
dix, no further account of the numerical strength is found,
but only a repetition of the figures ' 33,600,' without the
qualification of the word ' nearly ' (' pr6s de '), and the in-
quirer is left to guess whether the number of artillery-
men who served the 96 guns is meant or not meant to be
included in the ' total' 33,600.
The difficulty of accepting the loosely given ' total ' thus
furnished is increased by another circumstance. In an
APPENDIX. 407
early part of the work — a part prepared evidently with
much more elahoration than the account of tlie battle — the
Official Narrative gives the numerical strength appertaining
to the 42 battalions, the IG squadrons, the 9 sotnias, and
the 84 guns which were under the direct command of
Prince MentschikofF on the 13th of September 1854, and
there shows that, although 12 of the guns and 2 of the
sotnias of Cossacks, and the body of Sappers, acceding
to Mentschikoff before the battle were not in hand on the
13th, the strength even then was 38,597.* Except that
the Sappers were afterwards added, and that one battalion
of * Lithuania ' and another of ' Wiiiia ' were replaced by an
equal number of other battalions, i.e., by two battalions of
sailors, the 42 battalions of infantry shown to have had a
strength of 38,597 on Wednesday the 13th of September
appear to have been identical with those 42| battalions
which, according to the same official authority, were
gathered just seven days afterwards on the banks of the
Alma ;t and I think it must be acknowledged that, in the
absence of any epidemic, or any engagement with an enemy,
the falling off of the strength from 38,597, or rather from
39,000, X to 33,600 within the short period of seven days,
is a circumstance requiring a detailed explanation. § The
* ' Defense de Sevastopol,' p. 140. The reader will see how closely that
number of 38,597 approaches to tlie number I give — viz., 39,251, and
will observe tliat (with the requisite additions mentioned in tlie next
footnote but one) the 38,597 would be brought up to a number substan-
tially equalling the result of my computation.
t Compare the Table No. 8 in tlie Ajipendix to the ' Defense de Sebas-
• topol ' with the Table 13.
X I say 39,000, because, if the number of the Sappers, and of the 2 sot-
nias of Cossacks of the artillerj-men serving the 12 additional guns were
added to the 38,597, it would bring the numbers to more than 39,000.
§ 1 had once a conversation on this subject with the illustrious Gen-
eral lie Todleben ; but we had not the figures before us. What I gathered
was tliat he had relied upon some statements satisfying him that by leav-
ing behind weakly men, the strength actually present on the Alma L^id
been reduced to the number shown in the ' Defense.'
408 APPENDIX.
absence of any specific statement as to the strength of each
hattalion makes it impossible to know how, or witli what
amount of care, tlie loosely given total of 'nearly 33,G00'
has been reached; and I may own I am inclined to surmise
that there has been a clerical error or ' slip ' of some kind,
and that the total of horse and foot really meant to be indi-
cated was one reached by adding 3G00 cavalry to 33,000
infantry, and thus attaining 36,600 — a number which (Avith
the addition of the artillerymen for 96 guns) would bo in
fair harmony with the official statement of the strength
under the direct command of Prince MentscliikoiT seven
days before the battle.
Under these circumstances I have felt that it would not
be safe for me to discard the result of computations Avhich
for a period of some ten years after the battle were regarded
iu Europe as trustworthy for the sake of adopting a ' sum
'total' founded on no stated basis, and being possibly the
result of a penman's error ; but on the other hand, I so
deeply revere the authority of General de Todleben, that I
do not venture to negative absolutely that account of tlie
Russian strength on the Alma which he has allowed to
appear under the sanction of his great name; and have
accordingly taken care to submit the computations on which
I rely iu terms distinctly qualified.
I may say with great confidence that (in the absence of
some special reason for discarding it) the computation
which deducted one-fourth from the nominal strength of
a thousand, and gave accordingly an average strength of
750 to each Kussian battalion, has proved itself one Avhich
seems rather to understate than exaggerate the numerical
strength ; for we fortunately know the strength of each
regiment which fought at Inkerman, and that knowledge
enables us to say that almost all the regiments there en-
gaged (saving those that had suffered on the Alma) had at
even that late season a strengtli of considerably viore than
APPENDIX. 409
3000 each, — in other words, a strength of coiisiderably more
tlian 750 for each battalion.
After all, a difference of conclusion in regard to the nu-
merical strength of the Russians on the Alma is not a mat-
ter of so much import as might at first sight be imagined ;
for on the one hand, it must be acknowledged by ail that
the allies, French, English, and Turks, were together in
numbers exceeding those of the Russians bj more than a
third ; and on the other hand, it is equally plain that in
each of the several combats which took place between the
Russians and the English, on the day of the Alma, our
people were largely outnumbered.
410
APPENDIX.
NOTE II.
X.B.—Thn letters "a.b." mean "Artillery Brigade."
liiissian troops at the Alma, as posted at the commencemenl of the battle.
" The infantry strength is calculated
at tlie rate of 750 men for each bat-
talion, and that of the artillery at the
rate of 2(33 men for eight heavy guns,
and 210 men for the like number of
light guns. The strengtli of tlie cavalry
is stated at 3000. on the authority of
(ieneral de Todleben's 'Defense" de
Sebastopol. '
* Total opposed to the French, 13i
battalions, 10 guns, and 10,387 men
= General de Todleben believed that
only one battalion of marines was jire-
sent, but on grounds stated in one of
the footnotes, I adhere to the opinion
that there were two.
<^ General de Todleben believed that
only half a battalion of sappers was
present ; but the difference being un-
important, and liaving stated that
there was an entire battalion, on what
seemed to me good authority, I allow
the statement to remain unclianged.
' Total opijosed to the English, 23^
battalions, 68 guns, and 23,142 men.
Shortly after the commencement of the
action, four of the squadrons of regular
cavalry, and tlie two Don Cossack
batteries— viz , the No. 3 and No. 4 of
the 14th Artillery brigade, were moved
away to ground opposite the French.
/ Total held in reserve, 7 battalions,
18 guns, and 5722 men. Shortly after
tlie commencement of the action, the
three " Minsk " battalions, and also
both the batteries previously held in
reserve, were moved to ground oppo-
site the French ; and on the other
hand, the four "Volhynia" battalions,
which then constituted the whole of
Prince MentschikofTs reserves, were
dealt with by the English alone.
From these facts, and from those
stated in the last preceding footnote,
it results that the French, first ami
last, had against them 16 battalions
and a half of infantry. 4 squadrons of
cavalry, and 44 guns ; whilst the Eng-
lish, first and last, li.ad to deal with
27 battalions and a half of iufantiy,
16 squadrons and 11 sotnias of cav-
alry, and 68 guns ; but, on the other
hand, they were relieved in an early
period of the action from portions of
the cavalry and artillery previously
acting against them, beingthenceforth
confronted by only 12 squadrons of
regular cavalry (instead of 16), and
(instead of 08) by only 52 guus.
3
5
a-
73
.3
i
0
Men. ••
Brest regt. militia, .
Bialostock do.,
Taroutine regt.,
Moscow do.,
Part (say half) of 6th
Rifle battalion,
Minsk,
No. 4 (light) 17th of
a.b., .
Marines, <^
Vladimir regt. ,
1 Sousdal, .
Ouglitz, ,
' Kazan,
Borodino,
Sappers, cf .
i Part (say half) of 6th
Pdfle battalion,
Leuehtenberg regt., .
Grand - Duke Saxe-
Weimar,
37 th of Don Cossacks,
60th do.,
No. 3 (light) of 14th
a.b., .
No. 4, do. do..
No. 1 de position of
16th a.b., .
No. 1 (light) of do , .
No. 2 (light) of do., .
No. 3 position battery
of the Don Cossacks,
No. 4 (light) of do., .
Volhynia regt.,
Minsk do.,
No. 5 (light) of 17th
a.b., .
No. 12 of 6th Iforse
Artillery brigade, .
Total, .
•2
2
4
4
L
'i
1
1500
1500
3000
3000
375
750
262''
1500
3000
3000
3000
3000
3000
750
375
13600
210
210
394
315
315
263
210e
3000
2250
262
210/
39,251
10
2
4
4
4
4
4
1
!
8
8
5
6
8
8
12
12
12
8
8
'...
4"
3
...
1...
10
8
96
44
16
11
APPENDIX. 4 1 1
Summary.
Hussian forces at tlie commencement of the action.
Opposed to the Frencli,
English,
In reserve, .
Total, . 96 39,251
*^* The changes which took place in the course of the
action are duly indicated by the last foregoing footnote.
Guns.
Men.
10
10,387
68
23,142
18
5,722
NOTE III.
Note respecting the Operations of the 7th, the Eoyal
Fusiliers.
Written, it would seem, with the help of information
deriving from Sir George Brown, the ' Quarterly Review '
has this statement : —
' While this was going on upon the left of Codrington's
* brigade, the right, consisting of the 33d and 7th, gal-
' lantly attacked the Russian infantry which protected the
* battery and the Eedan, The battle was not fought, how-
' ever, as i\Ir Kinglake would have us believe. Lacy Yea
' and his gallant Fusiliers did just as well, but not one
' whit better, than Colonel Blake and his equally gallant
* 33d. The personal exploits of Lacy Yea, Mr Kinglake's
' particular jyi-otege, are about as authentic as those of
' Homer's heroes, and so is the long fight maintained by
' him and his men against five or six times tlieir number
' of Piussian troops. The two regiments went forward to-
* gether, Codrington leading them on. * They drove back
* This was a mistake of Sir George's. Codrington was not with the
7th Fusiliers. He, as we saw, led the 23d and the other troops with theia
Btraight into the redoubt.
412 APPENDIX.
* tlie JRussians and planted themselves on the brow of the
' height, from which the enemy retired ; and they remained
' there, partially engaged, till the Eussians rallied and ad-
* vanced to recover the Redan. Symptoms of unsteadiness
' then began to show themselves, and no wonder. A mass
* of Eussian troops came towards them in front. They
' saw their comrades driven out of the Eedan upon their
' left : they distrusted their own ability to keep the ad-
' vanced position which they had won, and tlmj loavercd.
*■ Sir George Brown observed this from the point where
' he was, trying to rally the 19th and 23d in their retreat :
' he rode over to the height and did his best to stop the S'id
' and 1th ; hut they wouhi not attend to him. It has been
' said that a bugle sounding the retreat misled them. For
' this the evidence is, to say the least of it, very incom-
' plete ; but whether by sound of bugle or not, they turned
' round and moved hack, slowly and doggedly, just as the
' Grenadier Guards came upon the ground and were formed
* and ready for action.
' Having opened to let the 7th and 33d j/ass, the Gren-
' adiers re-formed line and advanced against the Eussian
' columns in their immediate front. Sir George Brown
'went with the Grenadier Guards.' — ' Quarterly Eeview,'
No. 22G, p. 566.
Thus, according to Sir George Brown and the ' Quarterly,'
the 7th Fusiliers and the 33d Eegiment advanced side by
side up the slope, attacked ' the Eussian infantry which
' protected the battery and the Eedan,' and obtained a
temporary success, but then, under pressure of an advanc-
ing column, ' wavered,' and fell back, — fell back in such
a state that when the divisional General tried to stop them,
' they would not attend to him,' and continuing to fall
back, retreated through the Grenadier Guards.
On the other hand, my statement is that Lacy Yea and
his 7th Fusiliers did not move up at all with the rest
APPENDIX. 4 1 3
of the brigade to the line of the Great Picdouljt, because,
at the very moment of ascending the river's bank, they
encountered a heavy Russian column, with which they
remained long engaged ; that, at last, they defeated the
column ; and that, Avhen they had done so, Sir Thomas
Troubridge was sent to suggest that the enemy's retreat
should be pressed by an advance of the Grenadier
Guards.
!Now, of these perfectly dissimilar accounts, which is the
true one 1
"Without recurring to the means by which (as a sagacious
reader will infer) I gathered my first impressions of what
the battalion did, I must say, in the outset, that at tlie
battle of the Alma Sir Thomas Troubridge was a field-offi-
cer, on duty with the right wing of the regiment ; that,
from the beginning to the end of the engagement between
the 7th Fusiliers and the column, he, Sir Thomas Trou-
bridge, was personally present ; that he witnessed the de-
feat of the column with his own eyes ; that he himself
carried the message which suggested that the Grenadier
Guards should advance in pursuit ; that lie, Sir Thomas
Troubridge, is living — is living in London and holding
office at the Horse-Guards; and, finally, that he has over
and over again assured me of the substantial truth of my
narrative so far as it concerns what he saw of the opera-
tions of the 7th Fusiliers.
Colonel Yea did not live to hear it imputed to his
7th Fusiliers, — to hear it imputed to them by their divi-
sional General, — that they had given way at the sight of
an enemy's column, and had retreated in such a state that
they ' would not attend to him ; ' but some of Lacy Yea's
simple, truthful letters have been laid before me.
In a letter addressed to Lord Yiviau, and dated the 27th
of September, 1854, Lacy Yea describes the passage of the
river at the Alma, and then writes : — ' I had to deal with
4 1 1 APPENDIX.
' tlie 32J Regiment* — I should suppose of some distinc-
' tion, as they wore Wellington hoots, pulled high up over
* their trousers, and grand-looking helmets, and had kits
' which were beautiful, and which my men eagerly put on ;
' there was not one of them who would not have made a
* front rank for me. One of the men said they had been
' marched from Moscow, through Odessa, here. . . .
' There was an unlucky check in the 23d, which caused a
' similar retrograde in their supporters, the Fusilier Guards,
' which cost an enormity of lives in both regiments. /
' never stopped until tee drove our birds clean off the ground,
' having commenced with them after emerging from the
* deep banks of the river, within fifteen yards of their
* skirmishers.'
Shortly afterwards. Colonel Yea wrote to his sister, !^^rs
Cholmley Bering : —
* Jeffries being ordered home suddenly, I take the oppor-
* tunity of sending you, to take care of, a helmet ornament
' belonging to one of the regiments (Kussian) to which my
' regiment was opposed at Alma. It was the sharpshooters
' belonging to that regiment, which I found within fifteen
' yards when I rode up the bank out of the river. We — that
' is, the 1th — icere solely engaged against this regiment
' infhoui helj), and a prettg thrashiitg toe gave them.'
Colonel Aldworth writes the following letter to Sir
Thomas Troubridge : —
'J/«2/3, 1863.
' My dear Sir Thomas, — I write in reply to your in-
' quiry as to what occurred on the right of the 7th Royal
* Fusiliers at the battle of the Alma, after crossing the
' river.
* I was, as you know, in command of the right company
' of the regiment, and can confidently state that the right
* Two Ijattalions of the Kazan corps. Their accoutrcinents were
marked ' 32<1.'
APPENDIX. 415
* uing of the regiment did not at any time fall hacl\ We
' were opposed to a heavy Russian column, which had come
' down the hill and /tailed in our immediate front, tlirowing
* out numerous skirmishers. Tlie Guards did not pass us
' until this column had turned, and iras in full retreat. I
' cannot say much about the left wing, Imving seen but
' little of it during tlie engagement, owing to the smoke,
' and ray position on the extreme right. — Yours sincerely,
(Signed) 'R. W. ALDAVORTH, Coi,
' Lt.-Col. Commanding Ist Battalion
' Tth Roijal Fusiliers.'
Of Colonel Aldworth Sir Thomas Troubridge thus
writes: — 'The steadiness with which the men held their
' ground on the right, under a very heavy fire, was in
' great measure due to the example and coolness of this
' officer.'
iS'or is it only from the officers of the 7th Fusiliers tliat
the proof of what the battalion did at tlie Alma is to be
found. The regiment next on the right of Colonel Lacy
Yea's Fusiliers was the 55th. The 55th Avas commanded
at the Alma by Colonel, now General, Warren. In a
nieniorandum by him now lying before me, there is this
passage : —
* Sir John [Pennefalher] allowed the 55th Eegiment to
* follow Colonel Warren, who crossed the river and formed
* the regiment in line under the cover of a spur of the
* heights of the Alma, up which tliey advanced in line
* (Major-General Pennefather leading in front the battalion
* which was parallel to the Alma) ; then, having ascended
* this spur, they formed themselves in presence of a column
' of Russians who fired into them. This column of Rus-
' sians was at that time engaged with a part of the light
' Division iindtr Colonel Yea, and the 55th were directed
' by their Colonel to bring forward their right shoulders
4 1 G APPENDIX.
* and make a wheel to the left. . . . With this acces-
* sion to Colonel Yea's force, the Russians in a short time
' disappeared, leaving many on the ground.'
A writer, who seems to have enquired a good deal about
what was passing at the time when Sir George Brown im-
agined that the 7th Fusiliers ' would not attend to him,'
lias undertaken the somewhat intricate task of showing
how Sir George Brown fell into hi.s error. He thus
writes : —
' But we are not only able to free the 7ili Fusiliers from
' the effects of Sir George Brown's wondrous narrative.
* "We can do more : we can explain to Sir George Brown
' how it was that — honestly, quite honestly — he fell into
' his error, ^fr Kinglake states that, when the 7th Fusi-
' lici^ had defeated the left Kazan column, it was not
' thought wise for the victors to advance in pursuit them-
' selves, but to leave that duty to the Grenadier Guards.
* The 7th Fusiliers, therefore, at the moment of its victory,
* remained halted. i\Ir Kinglake also represents that the
' defeat of this left Kazan column took place "nearly at
' " the very time when disaster befel the centre of the bri-
* " gade of Guards." — (Page 410, third edition.) Attention
* to this, reinforced by information from officers present,
* soon discloses the cause of Sir George Brown's mistake.
' In their retreat, some of the Fusilier Guards passed
' through the left companies of the 7th, and these com-
' panics becoming entangled with the defeated soldiery,
' and having on their left front a fresh, a lieavy, and a
' victorious column of the enemy's infantry (the Vladimirs),
* were far from being in a state for any aggressive move-
* ment, and Avere in great need of the support which they
' got when the Grenadiers passed through them. It was
' from what he saw there — from what he saw at the ex-
* treme left of the regiment — that Sir George Brown formed
* the notion which he has imparted to the ' Quarterly.' If
APPENDIX. 417
' lie had riddou idong the line to Lacy Yea's right wing,
' he would have seen that, notwithstanding the critical
* state of its left comjDanies, the regiment (taken as a
' whole) was almost in the very moment of acliieving its
' final victory over the left Kazan column. If he had
' stooped to tlio use of a glass, and had condescended to
' recognise for a moment the existence of one of Evans's
' battalions, he would have seen the Kazan column slowly
' retiring, and would have been surprised to observe that,
' on ground Avhere he imagined there were none but his
' own Light Division regiments, Colonel "Warren with his
' ij.jth was not only well in advance, but had wheeled on
* his left, and was pouring his fire into the flank of the
' enemy's column. Far from doing this, and far from in-
* forming himself of the truth l)y subsequent inquiry, Sir
* George Brown has remained for nearly nine years under
' the impression produced on his mind by a glance at the
' extreme left of the 7th ; and, because at this time he saw
' the 33d and the 7th close together, and in nearly the
' same line, he seems to have inferred that from first to
' last they had been acting together.' — Pamjihlet by an
' Old Reviewer,' published by Harrison, Pall iNlalh — Note
to ith Edition.
NOTE IV.
PiRSPECTIXG THE StATEMEXT THAT MeX COMIXG DOWX FROM
THE PeDOUBT BKOKE THROUOn THE ScOTS PuSILIER
Guards.
A REVIEWER impressed with the ideas of Sir George
Brown said I was * wrong in having asserted that the Pusi-
' liers in their tumultuous advance encountered a heap of
* our men running away from the redoubt. The fugitives
VOL. III. 2 D
4 1 8 APPENDIX.
' from the redoubt were clean out of the way when the
' Fusilier Guards pushed forward.'
Is there any truth — any semblance of truth — in this
denial? We will see.
General Beiitinck, who was personally present with the
Fusilier Guards when they began their advance, wrote in
his Eeport the day next after the battle : ' The entrencli-
* ment partially won by the Light Division was lost, and at
* the moment some confusion was occasioned hy t/ie regiment
' obliged to abandon it retiring through the iScots Fusilier
' Guards, and thereby putting their left tving out of line.
' The battalion retired for a short time, re-formed, and re-
* turned to its post. In this partial movement to the rear,
* a .severe loss was sustained by the Scots Fusilier Guards.'
— HoIograx>h Report by General Bentinck. Colonel (now
General) Ridley commanded one of the wings of the Fusi-
lier Guards, and he has orally confirmed to me the truth
of the statement.
Colonel Percy commanded the left-flank company of the
Grenadiers, and was therefore so j)laced as to be able to see
what happened to the Fusilier Guards. He writes : ' The
' rcpitdsed regiments came down violently tipon them and
' broke their line. If the Russians alone had come down
' upon them, they would have been received with the
' bayonets.'
Captain the Honourable Hugh Annesley, an officer of
the Fusilier Guards, two days after the battle, made this
entry in his journal : ' Tiien the 23d came dotcn in one
' mass rigid on top of our line. Th(3ir disorder was
' caused by the Colonel and both Majors being killed, and
' no one knowing who to look to for orders. However it
•was, they swept half my company clean away, and a great
* many of the next one to if.' — Extracted from the original
MS.
Of the officers of the Fusilier Guards with whom I have
APPENDIX. 419
conversed on the subject, the one who was the least im-
pressed with the extent of the confusion thus wrought was
Lord Listowell ; but it is only in regard to the extent of
the mischief that he differs from the other eyewitnesses. I
hear that Colonel Sir Charles Hamilton (who commanded
the battalion, Colonel Jocelyn, Colonel Francis Seymour,
and others, all agree in stating that the line of the Fusilier
Guards was broken by the bodily pressure of the retreating
troops of the Light Division. "With the exception of Sir
George Brown, T do not remember to have heard of any one
present at the battle who held a contrary belief. — Note to
4th Edition.
XOTE V.
Respecting the Separation of thf. Vladimir
Corps into two Eodies.
I must acknowledge that I do not gather from the Rus-
sian accounts any distinct mention of this separation of
the great Vladimir column into two columns of two bat-
talions each. Prince GortschakofF's narrative speaks of
the column with which he moved as 'the battalions of the
* Vladimir regiment standing on the left of the epaulement '
(the breast-work), and this is an expression which might
either apply to two battalions which had been separated from
tlie other two, or it might apply to all the four battalions
of the corps. I have, however, found it so impracticable
to reconcile this last interpretation with known facts that
I have adopted the former one. Upon this point I am
not in terms helped by Kvetzinski's narrative ; but as he
himself was clearly with sojne of the Vladimir battalions
all this time, and as he had no knowledge of the fact that
Gortschakotf had made a charge with battalions of the
420 AITENDIX.
same corp?, it seems to follow as a necessary consequence
that at this time the four battalions liad been divided
into two columns. A concurrence of circumstances leads
me to infer that this was the case, and that one of the
columns, as I luive stateil, was towards the right aud
the other towards the left of the redonlit. At first sight
it may seen odd that Kvetzinski, the divisional general,
should not know what was being done with two of his
battalions posted at only a small distance from the column
AA'ith which he rode ; but the truth is that Gortschakoff,
having for the time tlie supreme command in this part of
tlie held, and being (as is evident from his ov/n account)
in a high state of excitement, roilo up to the Vladimir
battalions, which he found near the (Ivussian) left of the
earthwork, and, so to speak, snatched them without saying
a word to the general commanding the Division. After
all, the movement Avhich he made in advance was onl}' a
slight one; and for that reason, perhaps, it was hardly
looked upon as severing the troops taking part in it from
those which remained with Kvetzinski.
NOTE YT.
The ArPAKiTioN of TnE'UxKxowx ]\[oun'tkd Officer.'
This occurred so frequently in the battles of the Crimea,
that an ex])lanation of the cause would be dbsirable, but
I must own myself to be without a fixed opinion on the
subject. The apparition might be that of an aide-de-cjimp
bringing a real order from some general who proves
afterwards willing to be silent on the sidijert ; or, again,
it might be some officer of so anxious a temperament,
and at the same time so immen.sely presumptuous, that ho
APPENDIX. 421
does not scruple to utter a direction to troops in a moment
of crisis without having any authority to do so. Whe-
ther the dangerous visitor really escapes identification, or
whether men who have recognised him choose to hold
their tongues on the subject from motives of ])rudence or
good nature, I cannot say ; but the subject is one which
in the event of a war would deserve very careful attention;
for a wrong and unauthorised direction to troops in the
critical moments of a fight must, of course, be beyond
measure mischievous, and may prove to be a cause of
disaster. It would apparently be easy to provide for the
identification of all mounted officers not acting with their
regiments; and other obvious means might be suggested
which would have the effect of averting the evil.
NOTE VII.
Eespectixo some of the Conditions which may ixter-
FERE with the DeSIRE TO FiGUT IN LiNE.
The power which a nation may have of fighting in line
depends, perhaps, mainly upon the constitutional tempera-
ment of its people, but in some degree also upon the
question whether the high quality of its Soldiery is fairly
spread through the bulk of its arm}'. jS"o nation can
expect to be able to fight in line if the prowess of its
people is so abundantly gathered into the choice regiments
as to leave the rest of the army in a condition of recognised
inferiority. In Sir George Cathcart's book there is an
interesting statement both of the causes which deprived
the French of the power of fighting in line, and of the
manner in which the predicament was met by the genius
of Dumouriez. The system which JJumouriez contrived
422 APPENDIX.
us a makeshift was attended villi success so Liilliaiit tliat
it -was not only acted upon by France herself throughout
the revolutionary Avar, but was adopted by all the Con-
tinental Powers which came into conflict with her ; and
until the English displayed to them once more the line
formation, Bonaparte and the other imitators of Dumouriez
were encountered by nothing but their own system — their
own system, worked out with inferior ability, and with
means to wliich the system was ill adapted. Dumouriez's
system is the one still used by France, and still rendered
necessary by the manner in which the French army is
constituted. A French general goes into action probably
with a strong proportion of cavalry, but certainly with a
very powerful artillery. lie also has several Zouave,
Chasseur, or other choice regiments, well fitted for skir-
mishing and for close, bold fighting in villages, enclosures,
and broken ground ; but a great part of the rest of his
army consists of masses, the fruit of the conscription —
masses which may be so displayed as to give an appearance
jf impending strength, but which, he well knows, must not
be placed in any very trying situation. Thus provided and
thus clogged, he tries to make such a \ise of his artillery
and of his choice regiments as shall avert any extended con-
jlici between formed hattulions. If he can do that {he did so
in the Italian campaign of 1859, but at the horrible cost of
sacrificing his choice regiments), he will have a very
good chance of winning the battle, llis difficulties, how-
ever, are likely to be increased by the progress of modern
invention ; for the new artillery is making it hard for
him to know where to place the less impetuous part of
his army.
Al'PENDIX. 423
NOT E YllJ.
Rkspectixg tue abandoxed Tueory tuat the Dekbat
uF THE Column of the Eight IVmtamoxs had been
EFrECTED BY IXFANTUY.
At one tiiuu the French stated (see Du Casse, * Precis
• Historique ') that the retreat of this great cohimn was the
result of a figlit with tlieir infantry ; but no such representa-
tion is now j)ersisted in, for the French official statement
(agreeing in that respect with Kiriakoff) says fairly that what
forced the column to retreat was — not any sort of combat
with the French infantry, but the fire of the batteries
mentioned in the text. After describing the advance of
the great Kussian column, the official French statement
says : — ' D^j^ cette colonne (5tait parvenue a 150 metres de
' la droite du 7" de ligne, et la situation dovenait tr6s
' critique lorsque les deux batteries de la division Canrobert
* (qui avaient ete forc^es d'aller passer au gue d'Almatamak),
' et les deux batteries de la division Bosquet, arrivent au
' galop sur le champ de bataille, ouvrent un feu terrible
' contre la colonne Russe, lui font eprouver des pertes
' considerables, et la forcent a la rctraite.' — * Atlas His-
' torique et Topographique de la Guerre d'Orient.' The
only words in this official statement which might produce
a wrong impression are those which describe the guns as
coming up at a gallop. AVhen the train was travelling
along the hollow, it no doubt moved as fast as it properly
coidd ; but when the guns were brought part way up the
slope, and unlimbered and ])laced in battery, the operation
was piirformed so skilfull}', and, so to speak, so stealthily,
that Kiriukoir never made out the quarter whence destruc-
tion came, aiid imagined that his column was rent by the
junnery of the ships. ^My knowledge of the exact way ia
424 APPENDIX.
■\vliicli these guns were brought to hear upon tlie hapless
cohiuin is derived from a Frencli officer Avho was present
■with the guns, and who took part in seizing the occasion
wliicli was presented by the sudden discovery of the
column. Wlien an account of an infantry figlit Avith 'the
'column of the eight battalions' had once gone out to
the world, it may seem strange that the story should be
afterwards repudiated by any French personages writing
or drawing officially ; but, besides that there is really a
strong, honest leaning towards truth in the ' Atlas His-
' torique,' it is obvious that the French artillery officers,
whose skill and quickness had shattered the great column
and driven it from the field, might justly and most cogently
call upon the authorities to withdraw the falsehood which
gave to French infantry the credit justly due to French
gunners.
NOTE IX.
XOTE RESPKCTING THE TuUTII OF THE ACCOUNTS WHICH
REPRESEXT THAT A GrEAT AND TeRRIBLE FlGHT TOOK
PLACE NEAR THE TeLEGRAPU ON THE DaY OF THE
Alma.
In the beginning of the year 1855 the Baron de Eazancourt
was sent to the theatre of war by the French ' Minister of
'Public Instruction,' and the 'Mission' with which the
Baron went charged was tliat of writing a history of the
Crimean expedition. He Avas accredited to the then French
Commander-in-Chief by the Minister of War, and beseems
to have been freely supplied with all such materials for
getting at the truth as could be found in the niilitar}' jour-
nals of the French army, and in the statements voluntarily
APPENDIX. 425
uiadu to the hi.storian-elect by officers who had themselves
directed the operatious which they undertook to describe.*
Closely translated, tlie Baron's account of the supposed
light at the Telegraph runs thus. After speaking of tlie
point where the building of tlie Telegraph stands, he says :
— ' It is there that the battle is ; it is there that there are
' the efforts of attack and defence. On all sides we crown
' the plateau ; but the considerable Itussian forces massed
* behind the Telegraph, the sharpshooters sheltered in this
' partly-built tower, and the batteries placed right and left,
* decimate our troops. Already the 1st Zouave Eegiment
* and the first battalion of the Chasseurs of the 1st Division,
' and on their left the 2d Zouaves of the 3d Division, shel-
' ter themselves behind tlie undulations of the plateau,
' and were keeping up a sustained fire against the Russians,
' when two batteries of the reserve, led by Commandant
' La Boussiniere, came to oppose artillery to artillery. The
' battery of Captain Toussaint quitted tlie road in order to
' arrive more rapidl}^, by a moveuient towards its left, just
' in front of the Telegraph ; the Zouaves themselves help
' to drag the guns up the lust acclivities. They are soon
' placed, and open their lire, to which the Zouaves of the
' two divisions and the foot Chasseurs add a redoubling of
* lire. Four Russian guns quickly limber-up and with-
' draw. But the fire of the enemy's masses, and that of
' the artillery placed in rear of the Telegraph, cause us
' serious losses. This position of expectancy could not long
* be maintained ; an impetuous charge of the Russian
* cavalry on this point was imminent.
' Colonel Cler, who knows the war-tried and resolute
' troops which he commands, comprehends that he cannot
* save them from utter destruction but by one of those
' sacrifices which snatch victory. For an instant he hesi-
' tates between a charge with the bayonet against the great
• See his Preface, p. (3.
126 APPENDIX.
' front of tlie liu.ssiau square and an attack on the tower of
' the Telegraph, the centre and culminating point of the
* enemy's line. It is upon this last ])lan that he decides ;
' and, going forward in advance of the angle formed by
* the regiments, and putting his horse into a gallop, he
' cries out, "To me, my Zouaves ! To the tower! to the
' " tower ! "
' All precipitate themselves at the same time — that
' is, the 2d Zouaves, the 1st Zouaves, with Colonel Bour-
' baki at their head, the foot Chasseurs, the 39th IJegi-
* mcnt, which comes up ^vith Colonel Beuret and General
« d'Aurelle.
* It is a human torrent wliich nothing stops. Colonel
Cler comes the first to the tower ; all have followed him ;
* all arrive ardent, impetuous, irresistible. The struggle
' was short, but it was one of those bloody, terrible strug-
' gles in which man fights body to body with his enemy
' — in wliich the looks devour each other [oh les regards se
' ddvorent, whatever that may mean] — in which the hands
* grapple each other — in which arms dashed against arms
' are made to yield sparks of fire.* Dead and dying are
* heaped together, and the combatants trample upon them
' and smother them.
* The Kussians received tiiis formidable shock on the
* points of their bayonets ; they ask each otlu-r if these are
' indeed but men [si ce sont des homines] who thus dare
' to rush u{)on death. They fight, but soon they stagger ;
' and these formidable masses, menaced on all sides by the
* two divisions which advance in close columns, become
* broken, and operate their retreat.
' Colonel Cler seized the eagle of his regiment, which he
' plants on the tower to the cry of, " May the Emperor
' " live ! " Sergeant-major Fleury of the 1st Zouaves rushes
* upon the up})er scafToIding of this partly-built building
* I Lave observed this pheiionieiion in figlits upou tlie stage.
APPEiSDIX, 427
' and balances the flag, which siukd with the intiejiid iion-
' commissioned ofticer struck in the forehead by a canister
' shot [une balle de mitraille]. The Hag of the 1st Zouaves
' also lloats on this glorious troj^hy, which a fragment of a
' shell breaks at the staff [flotte aussi sur ce glorieux
' trophee qu'un eclat d'obus brise a la hampe]. Lieutenant
' Poitevin, ensign-bearer of the 3yth, precipitates himself in
' his turn outside his battalion, and comes, in the midst of
' a rain of projectiles, to plant on the tower of the Tele-
' graph the eagle of his regiment ; a cannon ball [un boulet]
' strikes liim full in the breast, and stretches him lifeless.
' Every one amongst all these intrepids seemed to have in
' himself the enthusiasm of death.'
That is the account which M. de Bazancourt gives, and
he does not seem to have found himself cramped by the
officially-admitted fact that in the whole battle the French
only lost three officers killed. One of these, Lieutenant
Poitevin, was struck, as Ave saw, after the Telegraph was
carried, and when the Russians weie operating their re-
treat ; but in the actual tight, terrific and murderous as
M. de Bazancourt represents it to have been, it does not
appear that any French officer was either killed, wounded,
or hurt.
It would seem that in 185G the feeling of the French
army respecting the story of the supposed fight at the Tele-
graph was not in such a state as to favour anything like a
repetition of M. de Bazancourt's description, for in that
year M. du Casse published his ' Precis Historique ; ' and
although he describes some portions of the battle at con-
siderable length, he disposes of the capture of the Tele-
graph in terms which do not necessarily denote any kind of
infantry fight, and in only eight words.* * The Telegraph,
* He adds an account of llie planting of the flags on the Telegraph ;
but his narratis'e of the taking of the Telegraph is, as I liave said, iu
eight words.
i-2!< APPENDIX.
* ilie key uf tlio posiliun, is carried.' ' Le Tel^grajHie clef
' de la pObition est enleve.'
If the acounts given by tlie French had ended there, it
might have been inferred that they wished quietly to re-
pudiate the bloody narrative of M. de Eazancourt, and to
drop the notion of saying that there Avas really a great
light at the Telegraph : but the oflicial atlas of the French
(Government renews the story ; for in the plan which illus-
trates this period of the battle, it places tlie Taroutine and
the ' Militia ' battalions close in front of the Telegraph antl
around it ; and the letterpress narrative accompanying the
plans has these words : — ' Le General Canrobert lance sa
' division sur les d(ifenseurs du Telegraphe ; apr^s un com-
* bat opiniatre aucj^uel prend part le 39^ de ligne de la
' brigade d'Aurelle de la 4'^ division, les Eusses sont
' chass(5s de leur position, et les drapeaux des V^ et 2® de
' Zouaves et du 3'J° de ligue llotteut successivement sur le
' T^Mgraphe.'
That the three flags were hoisted on tlie Telegraph no
one doubts ; but the question is, whether those triumphant
demonstrations were preceded by anything like a serious
light, Tlie difficulty of believing this is occasioned by the
tenor of the liussian accounts. General Iviriakolf Avas
naturally anxious to show that he had made an obstinate
stand ; and it may be imagined that if the heroic struggle
described by M. de Bazancourt had really occurred, General
Kiriakoff's narrative would have jnit it in full relief, lie,
however, says not a word of any sucli struggle. In one
part of his narrative ho speaks of the Taroutine and the
' Militia ' battalions as being so far in advance, and so low
down, that the batteries near the Telegrajih fired over their
heads : and at a later period of his narrative, without hav-
ing said a word about any intermediate operation, he says
that these battalions were under a cross-fire of artillery ;
and that, for that reason, and because the troops opposed
APPENDIX. 420
to the English were already in full retreat, he ' cnnmiandcd
* the march towards the main road.' Tie does not say a
word of the bloody struggle with infantry in which the
French represent his troops to have been engaged.
At first sight, it does not seem highly probable that,
upon the very summit of a smooth hill-top, where there
was nothing to offer cover for the body of even one man, a
few battalions (already dispirited by the passive endurance
of artillery- fire to which they had been condemned) should
be ordered to make a stand against the 30,000 Frenchmen
<ind Turks who wore converging upon that very ])()int from
the west as well as from the noctli ; and if Kiriakolf had
resorted to such a measure, it is all but incredible that his
careful and almost minute narrative of his operations should
have omitted all mention of an exploit strange in itself,
and, if only it were true, redounding very much to the
glory of his troops. Not only, howevei', does Kiriakoff
appear to have been ignorant of any such fight, but the
whole tenor of the narrative in which he describes what he
did is inconsistent with the notion that anything of the
kind could have passed. According to his statement, he
Avas a divisional general left without orders ; he saw his
troops suffering under a cross-fire of artillery ; he knew
(though apparently in an imperfect way) that overwhelm-
ing masses of French troops were more or less near to the
verge of the plateau, and being thus civeumstanced, and
seeing, moreover, that the English had already carried the
position, he thought it lime to withdraw his battalions
from the line of the artillery-fire ; but from first to last he
never was challenged or vexed by the near approach of any
French infantry. Such is his account. But this is not
all. Both Kiriakoff and the official French statement of
the * Atlas de la Guerre d'Orient ' agree in representing
that, after the check which it had given to Canrobert's
Division, the great 'column of tlie eight battalions' had
430 APPENDIX.
been kept logftlior, and moved a good way in the right
rear of the Telegrapli, without ever engaging in a)iy kind of
struggU". witli infantry. Now, except the troops composing
that coluinn, tlie only battalions of Russian infantry which
were at any time in this part of the field were the Taroutine
and the 'JNIilitia' battalions; and accordingly, these are
the troops which the French official ' Atlas ' places in array
at the Telegraph. Now the ' Militia' battalions, we saw,
were inferior troops, and had ilissolved. There remained
the Taroutine battalions : and if any stand had been really
made at the Telegraph, these must liave been the troops
which made it. It happens, however, that an intelligent
and highly-instructed field-officer of that corps has written
an apparently complete account of every part of the battle
of which he was competent to speak ; and if any of Kiria-
koff's forces, but still more if any of the Taroutine battal-
ions, had made the stand alleged, it is quite incredible
either that Major Chodasiewicz, who was present with the
Taroutine corps, should have remained ignorant of the fact,
or that, knowing it, he should have omitted to state the
truth. If any of the Taroutine battalions had been engaged
in a fight of this sort, it would have been for them the
grand, the all-absorbing event of the day ; for it certainly
was not their fate to be brought into conflict with French
infiintry in any other part of the field, and they would not
have failed to remember an obstinate and bloody fight of
the kind described by the French. But Chodasiewicz,
though he minutely describes the way in which the Tarou-
tine battalions were galled in their retreat by the fire of
artillery, does not say a word of any kind of fight at the
Telegraph between French and Russian infantry. Yet his
was the very regiment which, if the French story were true,
must have borne the brunt of the alleged fight.
Upon the whole, I have conceived that these authentic
and trustworthy narratives of General Kiriakoff and Major
APPENDIX. 431
Chodasiewicz* Ibrljid nie to admit into my text any state-
ment similar to the account given by M. de Bazancourt, or
even to that contained in the ' Atlas de la Guerre d'Orient ; '
but those who are so constituted as to wish to incline the
ear to a teacher duly prejxired for them by the French
Emperor's ' Minister of Public Instruction,' will find in the
above quotation from M. do Bazancourt, the sort of guid-
ance they like. — End of Note to \st Edition.
In dealing willi this question of the supposed fight at
the ' Telegraph,' I did not atfect to conceal the leaning of
my own opinion ; but still, I avoided the language of
actual assertion, and was content to speak in terms Avliich
were fitted — not so much to demand assent, but rather — to
provoke inquiry. Accordingly the subject underwent dis-
cussion ; and by-and-by (though not at tliis moment, nor
in this Appendix) I shall try to show the state of the dis-
pute which my narrative served to invite.
Meantime I will only say that concerning the whole
notion of a great fight with organised masses of Russian
troops at the Telegraph, inquiry has hitherto strengthened
the opinion disclosed in the text ; and if I have done a
wrong to the French, it is in imputing it to them too gen-
erally that they warranted M. Bazaucourt's story. Mar-
shal St Arnaud's despatch not only says nothing of any
such a fight at the Telegraph, but virtually confirms that
narrative of the Russian retreat on which I relied ; and the
story, as we before saw, is substantially rejected by the
* Precis Historique.' — Note to Afh Edition.
See now — and this seems absolutely conclusive — tlie
quotation from the ' Souvenirs d'un officier du 2™«
Zouaves,' which will be found in the footnote, ante p. 298.
— Note to 5 th Edition.
* Anitclikoff was an officer of the Staflf, whose narrative is b.ased on
accounts taken from various Russian sources, and he says not a word of
any fight at the Telegraph, norof any other combat wliich could have bt en
confounded with it.
432 APPENDIX.
N 0 T E X.
^lOTE CON'TAIXIXG AX ExTKACT FROM A Lr.TTRH ADDRESSKD
BY Colonel Napier, tihc Historian of the Penin-
sular AVar, to Lord Fitzroy Somerset.
If the forogoing v(jluTiie lias begun to disclose to its readera
the entireiiess of Lord Raglan's devotion to the public ser-
vice, his more than common swiftness of action, his subtle
understanding of the feelings of other men, and his tender-
ness for their honest pride, it may be interesting to hear,
that some thirt}' years before the time I write of, <]io?e
very qualities had been ascribed to Lord Fitzroy Somerset
by the Historian of tlie Peninsular War. Hi a letter of
October 1824, which is now before me (but which I never
saw until long after the publication of this book), Xapior
wrote : —
' My dear Lord Fitzroy, — The lapidity with which
* you have fuliilled 's desires would be extraordinary
' coming from any other quarter, but your accurate know-
' ledge of everything that does or has belonged to the army
* enables you to do before others can ilnrilc. You are well
' aware from tlie long acquaintance j'ou have had with my
' opinions that I am no flatterer, and that I am not dis-
' posed to express sentiments wliich I do not f(>el, I would
' certainly rather have my feelings judged of by my actions
' than by my words, but I shoidd be wanting both to you
' and myself if I failed to express ]ny admiration of the
' unabated warmth witli which you assist real merit unin-
' fluenced by any consideration but the services of the in-
* dividual. iN'either has the delicacy with which you have
' upon soveral occasions kept back all appearance of per-
* sonal protection been unobserved ])y myself or those
' numerous claimants who have at different times found a
' sure friend in you when they couM lind none elsewhere.'
A rr F.N J) IX. 4 "3
Whon I pce Nnpior wriliiij; that Lf.nd Fitzrny .Snmorpet
con]d iln heloie others could fhivlc, I am reiiiindod of a
Rinj:;nlar inPt<aiice of the iinconiTnon swiftness witli Avhich
liis mind -worked. One day in the Peninsula, and at a time
Avhen the ITeadquniters Staif were moving' along the road,
there was hrought an intercepted despatch, hnt it was iu
cipher — in a cipher nnknown. Lord I'itzroy Somerset took
up the paper, and, still riding on with the rest of the Staff,
began to licnd his mind to the letters and signs. Before
he qnitted his saddle, he had pierced the secret, had fonnd
out the key, and had read the despatch. — Note to ith
Edition.
X 0 T E XL
Extract from a ]\rKMOUA\nu:\r of a Conversation hkld
WITH Sir Edmund Lyons, whicu was made by Mr
Georgk Locit, i.ate jVIember for Sutherlandshirk,
February 10, ISoG, and approved as accurate on the
sA^rE DAY nv Sir 1'^dmund.
* Sebastopol nndouhtedly might have been taken within
* five days after we landed in the Crimea. He had earn-
' estly pressed that an immediate attempt should be made
* on it : Lord TJaglan had tlie .same feeling. After the
' battle of the Alma, the sanie day, he received a note from
* Lord Raglan requesting that ho would call on him by
* eight o'clock the folloAving morning. lie prepared to go ;
* but meanwhile he received a letter from Admiral Dun-
* da", saying that information had been sent hira by the
' Turkish Admiral, that seven Lussian line-of-battle ships
* had left tlie harbour, making apparently for Odessa, and
* ordering him (Sir Edmund) to get ready to follow them
* with the steam squadron. Sir Edmund answered that lie
VOL. III. 2 E
434 AITKNDIX.
cmild not understand this; that lie, Admiral Dundas,
ought to have better information on the subject than the
Turkish Admiral ; that he, Admiral Dundas, was himself
13'ing witliin twelve niilos of the harbour j that doubt-
less he had been watching it narrowly by means of the
numerous steamers at his command, and therefore that it
was not likely tliat such a squadron could have put to
sea without his knowledge ; that even if they had, it
was extremely unlikely they would go to Odessa, which
was a cul de sac' (He found afterwards that the Ad-
liral had kept no watch whatever on the harbour.)
' Before, however, this matter was cleared up, the time
for going to Lord Raglan had passed, and it was between
twelve and one before he got to Headquarters. On go-
ing in, after explaining the eause of his being late, Lord
Raglan showed him a memorandum made by Sir John
Burgoyne, in which he suggested the movement round
the head of the harbour to the Sebastopol side. He,
Sir Edmund, at once urged strong reasons against this.
He said that the character of the whole expedition was
that of a surprise ; that it was undertaken without ac-
curate knowledge of the strength of the enemy, or their
resources, and that in great measure they still remained
ignorant on these points ; that all they knew positively
was that the victory at Alma had been a heavy blow to
them, and that the best chance of continued success was
to follow it up rapidly, and to try and take tlic northern
forts by a coup de main. Lord Raglan said that he con-
curred in these views ; that he had already made repre-
sentations to St Arnaud on the subject ; that he proposed
to him at once to advance on the Belbec, cross that river,
and then assault the forts, but that St Arnaud had told
him his troops were tired, and that it could not be
done ; that he, Lord Raglan, was disajipointed by this
answer, and could not understand it, for ho knew the
APPENDIX. 435
' troops coulil not he tired, and tlmt there must Le some
' other reason.' (The trutli was, as afterwards known,
that St Arnaud was here stricken down by liis mortal
malady.)
' Sir Edmund again saw Lord Eaglan the following day,
' and found him in low spirits. On asking him the cause
* he said he had been again urging on the French General
* to advance across the Belbec, but that he had replied.
' that he had ascertained that the Russians had thrown up
* strong earthworks on the banks of the river ; and though
* he did not doubt that the Allies could force them as they
' bad the works on the Alma, tliey could not afford the loss
' that would be entailed. On this, Sir Edmund went on
' board a small steamer, ran close in, reconnoitred the
' works, found them to be as represented, but that they
' were without guns. He reported this, but the French
' General replied that he had already given his officers
* orders to commence the march round the harbour, in
' order to reach the south side ; that during this march, as
' is well known, they fell in with the rear-guard of Ment
' schikoff 's army abandoning Sebastopol ; and it is now
* known that the Russians had not left 2000 men in the
' place, believing it to be untenable.'
Hatchford, February 11.
I last night showed this memorandum to Sir Edmund
Lyons, saying that I had no business to make notes of
what ho had said without his knowledge. He returned it
after reading it, confirming its correctness.
(Signed) GEORGE LOCH.
{Private. )
Clumber, January 10, 1863.
My dear ^Ir Locn, — I am much obliged to you for
allowing me to read your interesting memorandum of a
conversation with Lord Lyons.
430 APPENDIX.
I was so often on board his flag-ship off SeLa3to})ol, that
you will easily su])pose that there is little iu it which is
new to nie ; indeed I can corroborate from other sources of
infuriuation a great deal of it.
What is related in page 20 struck mo with j^^rsuiial in-
terest. It was done under secret instructions from me,
scut (most irregularly of course, but, as I thought, justifi-
ably on account of the imminent danger) without the know-
ledge of my colleagues.
Tliis must be known to Kinglake, as he no doubt has
my letter. — I am, yours sincerely,
(Signed) KEWCASTLE.
NOTE XII.
Argument for avoidinq tue Attack of the
NoRTU Side.*
' The north front was exceedingly strong by nature, and
* extended across a ridge of buld and rocky heights, inter-
' sected by steep ravines. A permanent fort, consiiicuously
' situated in a commanding position, occupied its centre,
' and was supported on either side by earthen entrench-
' ments and batteries. The entire fruiit was exposed to
' enfilade liom the right of the position, where heavy guns
'could nuulily and securely be placed; and all the ap-
' proaches were cuuimanded by the men-of-war and steam-
' ers in tlie harbour. This position was, moreover, defended
' bv an aimy, which, although recently defeated, had re-
• It might Ije assuinuJ tliat tliis argument (extracted from tlie Official
Journal of our Siege Oiieratioiis) is substantially Sir John Burgoyno's ;
but those who prefer looking to his ])ublicly avowed words will find the
name argument iu p. '23b tl ntq. of his ' Military Opiuious.'
APPENDIX. 437
* treated to its supports, and was still very powerful, as
* subsequent events clearly proved,
' To assail such a position by a coup de main with an
' army little superior to the defenders, with nothing but
' field-pieces at its command, and with its flanks and retreat
* quite insecure, Avould have been a most desperate under-
' taking, with every probability of a failure or repulse, the
* consequences of which Avould have been most disastrous.
' A regular siege, on the contrary, required heavy guns
* and stores of all kinds, and therefore a harbour. Now
' the only place to the north of Sebastopol where the dis-
' embarkation of stores could be effected was the narrow,
* shallow beach at the mouth of the Katcha, open to every
' gust of wind, difficult to defend, and which, from its dis-
* tance in the rear, would have been much exposed, wliile
' its communications could have been intercepted at any
* moment by an enemy capable of such enterprises as he
* afterwards attempted at Balaclava and Inkerman.'
PRIXTEU tV WILLIAM BL.VLKWuuIj A.Si)
Tde accompanying Plans of the ground on which the
battle of the Alma was fought have been taken from the
Official French ' Atlas Historique,' but with slight changes
made here and there for the purpose of giving greater dis-
tinctness to some of the natural features.
I may take this opportunity of saying that the object of
all the Plans of battles and other military operations con-
tained in this and in the subsequent volumes is — not to
assert any facts thereby appearing to be indicated, but —
merely to aid the reader in his endeavours to follow the
statements he finds in the text; and accordingly they are
not to be regarded as either reaffirming or varying the
printed words of the narrative.
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY
Los Angeles
This book is DUE on the last date stamped below.
JUM 9 1952
tEC'& LD-U«
0EC27 ^
FormLO — 15w-10,'48 (B1039)444
UNi / of CALIFORNIA
AT
LOS ANGELES
LIBRARY
t
UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY
AA 000 747 955 3
PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE
THIS BOOK CARD ^
^l-LlBRARY6k
'^(f/OJlWDJOV
University Research Library
Live Music
Archive
Librivox
Free Audio
Metropolitan Museum
Cleveland
Museum of Art
Internet
Arcade
Console Living Room
Open Library
American
Libraries
TV News
Understanding
9/11